My Spin On It: June 2025

I thought today about how American I've become, even though I'd like to visit where my ancestors came from.

I credit my dad for taking us to Washington D.C. and to educational places like Hannibal, Missouri and Springfield, Illinois. My brothers got first hand experience in Europe as military kids, although I was there, not realizing where I was. But we were encouraged to watch the aftereffects of the War on TV, which perhaps, could have been censored.

There were things we relied on, like our dad being awarded a civil service job for his service and the V.A. Hospital for his exit. And I even received money from the Veterans Administration, to finish the last year of college, again, for his service. There were a host of other services that all of us have taken for granted, not as gifts, but a lot for our own public services, which didn't pay that highly during the time we worked. My husband, for example, was able to access the GI Bill for his service, in order to go to broadcasting school.

My English Lit major included a lot of American authors, such as the one who lived in Hannibal, Missouri. Following these authors and teaching about them involved following a timeline of our history.

So now, this has become MY country, sweet land of LIBERTY, and I WANT MY COUNTRY BACK. This means, not having to put up with a spoiled rich kid who had servants in Africa, like the top guy did in America, taking a wrecking ball to our government services, which allow its citizens to live with dignity.

Three and a half more years of this is NOT OUR AMERICA, though 1968 was pretty horrendous, I'll admit. It is upsetting, also, that a replay of Europe where we fought fascism like Germany in the 30's is being replayed in OUR OWN COUNTRY. This weekend, a religious conservative had a list of targets he could not complete, but we're sorry he got as far as he did. People like that make me glad to define myself as Spiritual, with a more thought out theology.

So, many thanks to all of you who put your shoes on and stood up for ALL of us, Citizens.

Instead of taking out my tablet first thing and being barraged with horrendous news, I looked at my project, a children's Bible, probably at middle school level. I thought, some of this is hilarious. Someone should present it as so. Turns out they have, like Joseph and his Technicolor Dream Coat and God's Favorite (poor Job). Is there a chance some stories were written tongue in cheek in the first place? My fellow storytellers might know

Reading a basic Bible is interesting. And it came to pass there arose a Pharaoh who did not know Joseph. We could say, And it came to pass, there arose a guy who did not appreciate Joe nor the Constitution he followed.

Basic Bible study: So Moses and Aaron go to Pharaoh and say, Let my people go, and Pharaoh says, For that, your people have to get their own straw and make just as many bricks. So now, we say, Let us be free to live. For that, I'll send my toadie to steal from your agencies. Go get your own money and produce as much as you did before, and that goes for your decrepit grand

mas and grandpas to be robbed of what they've already invested.

Basic Bible study, continued...So Pharaoh, in love with money and power, gets sent all these plagues: and dead cows, while now, the executive goes through an investigation, 2 impeachments, a pandemic that almost got him, an unfavorable election, 2 shots, 34 felonies, an assault charge that took, and bad polls. I call that "plagued".

Basic Bible lesson. Now, here comes the Pharaoh with all his chariots and men in hot pursuit. So, the Israelites are protected after the sea is parted, so the land will dry. Then when the Egyptians go after them, they can walk on dry land until they get to the other side. Then SPLOOSH! The waters drown, not just the Pharaoh, but the entire army.

So, the lesson is, it's not just the "leader's" materialistic, greedy, power-mad consciousness, (based on skin pigmentation so pale you think you have to spray tan it) but the entire group consciousness (for example, the reassertion of ugly Nazi-ism) that has to be done away with.

The result is worship and gratitude and music and dancing with joy.

Basic Bible reading: 40 years of wandering around in the desert doesn't seem like much fun. Getting thirsty and finding bitter water that has to be sweetened until finding better water, getting the same food sent down for a very long time. Needing to obey rules to not save or the food would sour and rules to save. Encountering an enemy to be fought, and Moses given a stone to sit on while 2 others lift his arms up and down. Finally Jethro, his dad in law, says you need to delegate judges instead of leading all by yourself: A formation of a government. It just shows us going through a critical period is not without hardships and complaining, as well as losing hope from time to time, but the outcome is Order not reliant
on 1 leader alone. This is a community project.

I told my husband I'm going to write a NEW Deuteronomy...NO tattoos...NO torn jeans.... Then, I realized, Oh, that's already in the OLD Deuteronomy.

So, as Gilda used to say...Never mind!

Basic Bible: It's getting complicated. Instructions for laws. People get impatient waiting for Moses and form a golden calf, which is puzzling, why a poor calf? Remind them of the laws again. Then, there are tribal laws. (If they asked Moses if he was also to obey these laws, I don't think he'd say, I don't know.) Then, there are worship laws, from which emerges the menorah, and priests assigned, even what they should wear. The cloud and the pillar of fire act as guides. The people complain and are fed, but then, they get sick. All this before they enter Canaan. It's been a rough trip.

Bible stuff: Well. it seems they made it to Canaan, but that would mean some folks would have to move over. But the travelers didn't want to bother "overcoming" the big and tall folks, as they were "like grasshoppers" in comparison. There had been a lot of whining and complaining and looking back on how much better they'd had it in Egypt all the way on the journey. A substory was when Balak invited Balaam, and the latter was forbidden, but went anyway. It seems his donkey was much smarter and more perceptive than Balaam and knew there was an Angel blocking the path. In fact, he was so smart, he could talk back after Balaam beat him three times. (Bill had told me about this donkey, as he was a wannabe Baptist minister, until he didn't wannabe. I said, "for real? A donkey who talked?" Then, he proved his point. So, I run into this story, yet again. It would make a good scene for a play.) Anyway, Moses and Aaron had screwed up, so the complainers got to go to the Promised Land, even though these two were always leading and encouraging them to keep going. I guess the stories mean follow the instructions, and complaining will only slow you down for 40 years.

Biblical application for today. My family moved to Wisconsin and arrived at a new church, so I got introduced to a new Sunday School teacher, who taught us all about Joshua, how the walls of Jericho tumbled down, and the sun and moon stood still, so we children thought, Wow! God did all that for Joshua, so they could move in to the place. Reading it later was a little more challenging, like you mean, there were people already living there? and you wanted them to move out? But if you bring it up to date, you could say there are people in a White House of the US of A, and maybe, they shouldn't be there, like because they tried to overthrow the government, vs. the Constitution. So, here's the original story. First, they send in 2 spies, and a woman (Rahab) hides them under flax stalks on the roof. At night, they climb down on a red chord and tell her to display it, so their people won't harm her or her family. This is a pretty good adventure story so far. (Rahab could be recast as the 2 conservatives on the Select Committee.) Then, they cross the Jordan and (with the Ark in front of them) march around blowing ram's horns until the 7th time, a time of completion. Obviously, they're a lot noisier this time. The gold they acqire is to go to the temple, but a greedy guy named Achan takes it for himself, sort of like our chainsaw guy, who didn't get stoned like Achan, but his car dealership did. A couple of clever con artists from Gibeon, who pretended to be from far away by dressing up in rags with spoiled bread, entreated Joshua to leave their city alone, so he did. (Think Cohen and Parnas) So Joshua moves his people from being nomads to farmers, which means they're finally settling in there. He tells them not to follow lawless religions they'll be bumping up against, since now, they got rid of the lawless inhabitants.

The first bookend to the Gideon story in the Bible is, Barak defeats a Canaanite general, Sisera. So Sisera flees to the tent of a woman, who kills him in his sleep.

Now, Gideon is a tester. Even though an angel appears to him, telling him to fight the captor Midianites, he demands a sign from him. It's apparently not enough that he meets up with an angel. Then he creates his own Oracle, not once, but twice. He gets instructions on how to select his army, by watching who laps the stream water and who cups the water in his hands. Then, he sends spies to hear a dream interpreted that Gideon is sure to attack and win. When he sends his men with lamps and trumpets, the enemy gets confused, and START FIGHTING WITH EACH OTHER.

Then, 40 years of peace.

When Gideon dies, the bookend has son Abimelech killing all the other sons, except one. But he meets his end while besieging a tower, and a woman drops a millstone on him, So, he asks his armor bearer to finish him off rather than be shamed that he was killed by a woman. What does that say for poor Sisera? For today, it's kind of interesting that there's infighting between 2 powerful, yet immature and spoiled men. How timely! So ancient history rhymes with the present.

Now comes a Biblical character named Jephthah, who made a stupid vow he crafted himself; The Israelites made Jephthah a soldier of fortune, to fight the Ammonites. So he made up a bargain with God that if he succeeded defeating the Ammonites, he'd sacrifice whoever came out to greet him afterwards. What was he thinking? Instead of a sheep or a goat coming out, it was his daughter. So, he rent his garments. She did ask for a pause for her and her handmaids to mourn. But then, he did as he had vowed...What?!! I didn't know about this story, either but my former wannabe Baptist minister showed this to me, too. If ai were to upgrade this one, I'd wonder why the editor took out the almost killing of Isaac, but this one was left in. Was it because she was expeendable? i.e. a woman? So upgraded for today, you could say, the first thing to go is Women's Rights, the handmaid's tale for today.

Everybody knows about Samson. Instructions are given that no razor shall cut his locks, and he'll have the strength to deliver his people from the Philistines. At least, this command comes from an external source. He killed a lion on his way to see his Philistine girlfriend, and honeybees swarmed around the lion. He created a riddle from it, so the Philistines threatened her who was now his wife. She coaxed him on the answer, which the Philistines told him, and he knew where they got it. He set fire to fox's tails and sent them out to the Philistines' crops. He was handed over to the Philistines, but he freed himself and killed 1,000 men. He judged Israel for 20 years

Enter Delilah, who the Philistines bribe, and like before, she coaxes him three times to tell the secret of his strength. Like before, he tells her, and she tells the Philistines. So they take him, blind him, and make him grind in the mill. His hair grows back, and he is brought out, puts his hands on two pillars, and brings the house down on everyone. To upgrade this story, if a system has become so corrupted, scrap the whole thing. I'd add, after cleanup, you can rebuild, provided it's staffed with more decent people.

nd Sandra J. Bogner-Follett

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