Honor thy father and thy mother.

This post will be of necessity a rambling, circuitous affair. I am stuck in a psychic bramble and I have the added sugar of an apple fritter coursing through my system and gumming up my internal works. It is another hot and sticky day in a row of hot and sticky days. I didn't send my niece a card for her wedding and have been labeled a miscreant and nearly excommunicated from my family. I said hello to a neighbor at the mailbox this morning and he chose to not hear me, looking though me like an old screen door.

The apple fritter was not really my fault, I chalk it up as a failure of geography. I was going to visit the Indian from Gujarat who bought the Post Office store near the market. I needed him to box up two drawings that I was shipping to Missouri. And the doughnut shop was just sitting there on my route, coyly and enticingly calling out for all my love and attention.

I squeezed into the white plastic patio chair with my woven basket and carton of milk and tore the deadly sugar bomb apart into threads like cotton candy. I watched and listened to the table of old timers nearby engage in a running commentary on their assorted dermatologic and circulatory ills. I kept an eye out nervously looking out for acquaintances who might turn me in for my gustatory felony.

I just hung up the phone on a collection agent, a man who thinks that squeezing me is going to free up money for a debt owed by a relative, a tact that at this moment has as much promise as squeezing water out of a large stone.

***

I am not what you would call a religious man but recognize that there are a lot of very useful and important truths in the bible, if you can get past all the smiting and the begetting. I particularly appreciate Proverbs, it is a book that can hold its own with most of the great books in its genre.

I also have been giving a lot of thought to this quote from Exodus 20:12 "Honor thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee." Now I am not going to pretend that I have been some dreamy son. There are more than a few times in my life where I could have been a bit more compassionate and attentive towards my mother, I won't lie.


I bring this up because of this Casey Anthony trial, you know the one that has most of the country glued to the television and now features the townspeople lighting torches and sharpening their scythes. Not having a television, I watched one day at a friend's house, specifically the defense closing. And I got to thinking, if she does get off, which I felt was probable, she is going to have as Desi Arnaz would say, some splaining to do. 


Because Jose Baez threw everything in the world at the wall, just to see what would stick and accused both the defendant's father and brother of sexual abuse and molestation. Now I wasn't ever in the Anthony home and do not know what did or did not take place in her childhood. But think that it is not beyond reasoning for a criminal defense attorney to concoct the most ludicrous allegations like this if it meant getting his or her client off the hot seat. And I wouldn't be surprised if the defendant and attorney both fabricated the entire story. We are going to throw your dad, mom and brother to the wolves and they will forgive us some day if it means getting you off. They left the trial grim faced after the verdict was read, without giving their little angel so much as a look.


I was at the gym this morning, doing penance for my calorie laden confection and ran into my old friend Tom, an attorney who used to be with the D.A.'s office. We talked about the case and he felt that Baez's behavior was despicable. He also said that the department wouldn't ever try for first degree murder charges unless they had a video or a witness because american juries are too stupid to understand and convict on circumstantial evidence. Especially if the defendant is a cute girl with a nice rack.

Now I know that we have the greatest judicial system in the world, blah, blah blah. I know that everybody is entitled to a spirited and vigorous defense. What we are not entitled to is attorney's knowingly making shit up.

Would it be so hard to require that we force the attorney's who get all of these scummy murderers off on technicalities by weaving these fairy tales of pixie dust actually live with their charges for a year or two after they are exonerated. Little Casey can babysit the Baez children. Richard Speck can rock them to sleep at night. These attorneys seem to have no qualms about fabricating imaginary defenses out of thin air. Make it a bit more personal for them. Maybe then they will think twice about participating in these great flights of fancy and siccing their evil clients on the american populace.

***

I have heard the words malignant narcissism about five times in the last month. Somehow, the phrase hit a tipping point last week and I had to look it up. Thought that it might have been one of those catch words they frequently bandy about in A.A. but I was wrong.

Here is the entry from Wiki, not the Rush song: Malignant narcissism has been described as "an extreme form of antisocial personality disorder that is manifest in a person who is pathologically grandiose, lacking in conscience and behavioral regulation, and with characteristic demonstrations of joyful cruelty and sadism".^[1]Malignant narcissism is a theoretical or 'experimental' diagnostic category; although narcissistic personality disorder is found in the current version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR), malignant narcissism is not. Individuals with malignant narcissism would be diagnosed under narcissistic personality disorder. Malignant narcissism can be partially treated with medications and therapy, helping to reduce aggravating symptoms. As a syndrome, it may include aspects of schizoid and narcissistic personality disorder, as well as paranoia — recent^[when?] "contributions have confirmed the importance of malignant narcissism and the defense of projection" in the latter syndrome, as well as "the patient's vulnerability to malignant narcissistic regression".^[2]

Now when I hear about conditions like this, the first thing I do (being your everyday garden variety narcissist, a benign narcissist, if you will) is look in the mirror and see what personally fits. Pathologically grandiose, maybe, but I don't think I am necessarily "obsessively cruel or sadistic".

So I looked at the next google entry on the mal nar syndrome and it was this woman's blog, a woman so devoted to hating her parents that she created an online forum to chronicle the experience. I started reading a few of this woman's whiny tantrums about her evil parents and just wanted to puke.

***

I put up a music video the other day featuring Buddy Merrill, Welk's great guitar player. And doing a little research on the guy found this doozy, his daughter Cheryl bleating about how he had mistreated her at camp and made her play the spoons. She even rats him out for having a porno magazine in his drawer. She titles her piece: Buddy Merrill - Former Guitarist For Lawrence Welk ripoff a loser dead beat father, 3 time divorcee adulterer, into porn in the 70's Hollywood California. Even says he was a lousy musician, which is flat out wrong. You have to stay classy. I think poor Cheryl needs to read a little Exodus 20:12.