Love my house. Love the setting. But what REALLY makes the place is the neighbors. Please allow me to introduce you to some of my favorites:



This is Bob. He's the first neighbor I met on the ranch in southern Douglas County, Colorado, and the initial impression was of him stalking across the lawn of my home in complete disregard of property lines. Bastard!



Please meet Coy, who is much more communicative and a much more regular visitor than Bob. Coy and his posse frequently sing in the pasture that passes for lawn out on the ranch, and they enjoy chit-chatting with the horses (the horses don't seem to enjoy it as much).



Red is the foxiest of my neighbors, plus she's curious and playful. Her voice is kinda bark-y, so she might want to cut back on the smokes, but she's also a terrific mother. (Aside: I've had a number of close encounters with red foxes, including one that followed me when I was out for my morning power walk - - just wanted to know where I was going with such a PURPOSE, I guess! )



Buck is the patriarch of a large, extended family that includes his wife, Jane Doe. They're very quiet, friendly neighbors who tend to eat over a LOT.



I'd heard about Bruno, but I met him for the first time just yesterday morning - - as I was returning from my early a.m. walk, I spied him about 50 feet ahead of me on the dark road. Just to be friendly, I said "What the heck IS that?" and Bruno, being the shy and retiring type, hot-footed it into the woods on the other side of the road. It would appear that he needs some grooming tips, as I could hear his nails scratching the pavement until he started crashing through the underbrush.





Cat is our most reclusive neighbor - - I have yet to meet her, although I hear tell that she knows who I am and is very interested in becoming acquainted with my thick-necked Manx cat. (Aside: Researchers using heat sensors found that hikers in wilderness areas were frequently stalked by mountain lions - - the sensors would show a hiker traipsing along a trail, while a mountain lion followed silently a little ways back and off-trail. This went on for long distances with no attack occurring - - it appeared the lion was just doing it for fun. )

Won't YOU be my neighbor?

"'What is REAL?' asked the Rabbit one day. 'Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?'

'Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with but really loves you, then you become real.'

'Does it hurt?' asked the Rabbit.

'Sometimes,' said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. 'When you are Real you don't mind being hurt.'

'Does it happen all at once like being wound up,' he asked, 'or bit by bit?'

'It doesn't happen all at once,' said the Skin Horse. 'You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't often happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out, and you get loose in the joints, and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.'"

Margery Williams
"The Velveteen Rabbit"

(This is a re-post of the re-telling of a re-volting Scottish legend - - is it true, or is it myth? No one knows......but it COULD be true.)



See if you can discern the moral buried very, VERY deep within this cautionary tale.....

Once upon a midnight dreary, as I pondered.....ooops, that's another frightening story! Let me just get my thoughts together here. Oh, yes, here we go:

Long, long ago in a small village in Scotland, a ditcherman and his wife welcomed into that windy world a son. If they could've seen the future, they might have named him Butch or Killer or Hannibal - - instead, they named him Sawney Bean.

Who knows where it all went wrong? Was Sawney the first casualty of a two-income family? Was he an undiagnosed schizophrenic, in a time when ALL schizophrenics were undiagnosed and were "treated" with fire, bleedings, leeches, exorcisms, and stonings? Or was he the personification of evil? (Your answer will reveal you as Democrat or Republican....)

What we know is that Sawney grew up in the small village on the east coast of Scotland, digging ditches alongside his da' and chafing under the burden of having to work for his sustenance. When an Irish tinker and his family rolled into town, Sawney became entranced by the tinker's daughter, Grainne', and she looked upon his vacuous, uneducated, grimy, misanthropic visage and she too was well pleased. Without much forethought - - without even so much as a look at MapQuest or the Weather Channel or holding a bridal shower - - Sawney and Grainne' ran away together, heading for the opposite coast to set up a new life as common law husband and wife.

The journey took a lot out of 'em, and they had little money left when they arrived on the west coast of Scotland. They were both of the mind that they didn't want to live near other people, nor did they want to pay for their lodgings or their victuals - - this led them to find a cave along the shoreline, where at high tide the water came up into and disguised the cave's entrance but which at low tide was accessible to those who knew it was there. The cave extended many yards under the land and offered a number of warm, dry chambers where Sawney and the little woman could live comfortably. But now, what to eat?



After much thought and reasoned discussion, Sawney and Grainne' resolved to live off the land - - they would eat only the game and vegetation native to that region. My, but they were ahead of their time in terms of environmentalism! Sawney found one game animal in particular that was slow-moving, lacking in suspicion of humans, and awfully tasty.........other humans. Travelers passing along the shore road between the two nearest villages made for easy pickin's and provided not just meat but also wealth. For Sawney and Grainne', nature had provided and they were livin' the good life, albeit la vida loca.

The years passed. Sawney and Grainne', being healthy red-blooded Scots, had a passel of children. Keeping the little mouths fed became an all-consuming (please pardon the pun) task for Sawney, and residents of both nearby villages began to notice that travelers who left one village were quite frequently not reaching t'other. The local gendarme also noticed the coincidental disappearances and began to lynch the innkeepers where the missing travelers last stayed - - a system of justice that has made its way across the pond to the U.S. in modern times, demonstrating just how canny those Scots were/are. But I digress - - no matter how many innkeepers were executed summarily, travelers kept disappearing.

Well, of COURSE they kept disappearing - - by this time, Clan Bean was numbering in the dozens. As the children of Sawney and Grainne' grew up, they began to mate with each other and with their parents, creating an inbred horde of human flesh-eating savages. At the point of the family's 25th anniversary of living in the cave, its residents numbered 46 people who were each a combination of son, daughter, aunt, uncle, sister, brother, cousin and god knows what else. For 25 years, the family had lived off the fat of the.....land; but 25 years of success and inbreeding had made them bold and intemperate.



In one of the villages along the coast, a dismembered leg washed ashore - - the locals took it as evidence that some great evil lay in their midst, devouring lone travelers and spitting the less edible parts into the sea. A hue and cry (what IS a hue, in this context? Must look that up....) were raised and were finally heard by the reigning Scottish monarch, who authorized massive searches - - but the Beans were well-hidden and escaped detection. Then they made their fatal error....

A fair in one of the nearby villages had drawn large crowds of visitors from across the southern portion of Scotland, and the Bean clan knew that all they needed to do was lie in wait for that lone traveler or couple to wander into their sights. Finally, a man and his wife on horseback rode down the shore road and were set upon by Sawney and his sons/nephews/grandchildren/god knows what else - - the woman was dragged from her horse, disemboweled on the spot and a segment of Team Bean began to drag her corpse away. The man was able to maintain his seat on his horse, striking out at the marauders, whose luck had run out - - a large group of men crested the hill, returning from the fair and in their cups, no doubt. Seeing the attack underway, they charged to the aid of the lone man on horseback - - the Beans abandoned the fight and the woman's gutless body and fled back to their hidey-hole.

But now the local populace had a face for the terror - - the king of Scotland sent out more than 400 men to track down the Bean clan, using scent dogs who led the angry mob to the cave. What horrors greeted those first "guests" to Casa de Bean! Entire chambers of the cave had been devoted to smoking and pickling the flesh of victims, while other and cooler areas were meatlockers. In the deepest recesses of the cave, the mob came upon the snarling, filthy Bean family and took them gently into custody, reading them their rights I'm sure.

The Beans must have waived all their rights, because they were transported to Leith, tossed unceremoniously into custody without even a phone call (OK, minor technicality - - there weren't phones back then), and ordered to be exterminated. This was done in quite creative ways - - as the Bean ladies watched, the Bean gentlemen were deprived of their hands, feet and nether parts. The collected extremities were then tossed onto a roaring bonfire, quickly followed by the Bean women themselves as the Bean men bled to death. The final irony was the sound of tummmies grumbling hungrily as the faintly pork-like aroma of roasting human flesh wafted out of the fire........

So by now, if you aren't busy upchucking your breakfast, you must be wondering what the moral of this fable might be? There are several, one of which might be "Don't shit where you eat," and another might be that you should never breed with your own family. But I like to think that the moral is that "the sea will tell." And it did.

Yeah, yeah, yeah - - all of you amateurs out there are calling me a sell-out now, saying that I've caved in to the massive money and adulation that comes with being a pro sports star. Well, here's what I've got to say to THAT: Sticks and stones may break my bones, but paper covers rock, so I'll fry you in my wok - - your knees'll start shaking and your fingers pop, like a pinch on the neck of Mr. Spock! (Props to the Beastie Boys....)



That's right, amateurs - - I'm now registered in the United States Rock, Paper, Scissors League. Know why I started blogging again? Merely to keep my fingers nimble and my reactions cat-like.



The thing is, I've got a secret weapon. USRPS competitions are sponsored by Bud Light, the horse piss of choice for most RPS pros. Ah, but my technique is fueled by Guinness - - the Breakfast of Champions and mother's milk of the IRA. Guinness will give me the explosiveness, the wile, the resilience that has characterized the Irish for thousands of years.

Think you've got what it takes to go hand-to-hand with the likes of me in RPS matches, dog? Then BRING IT - - sign up at http://www.usarps.com/site/index.php today. Represent your country in the sport that's sweeping the planet, right behind competitive hula hooping.

Take one (1) child born to parents who are immersed in substance abuse or careers or anger/power/control; add the pinch of poverty; mix with other kids from similar backgrounds; place in hot water; ignore until set; eventually, stir.



The first juvenile court was established in 1899 in Illinois, with the recognition that children shouldn't be held culpable in the same way that adults are because they don't have the same capacities developmentally, intellectually and emotionally. The model at that time incorporated individualized sentences for juvenile offenders and strove for treatment of children versus punishment.

In the latter half of the 20th century, juvenile crime and violence began to increase, and for good reason:

1) Children of color who grew up in the shadow of Civil Rights efforts found themselves still disenfrachised

2) The divide between the haves and the have nots was widening

3) Movies and television and video games exposed many children to vast quantities of real and fictional violence

4) Recent generations of children were receiving amazingly mixed messages about identity - - not that long ago, historically speaking, teens were getting married and having babies and taking on adult responsibilities, and now there were more and more restrictions placed on them (although they were still being asked to go to war for their country)

5) Overall numbers of adolescents were growing

6) Conduct that once was dealt with through schools or parents had now been classified as criminal

In the wake of what was interpreted as increasing crime by adolescents, the reaction of the courts was to move away from the rehabilitation and due process aims of the late 1800s and early 1900s toward more punitive sanctions that might function as deterrents. The 1990s saw heightened scrutiny, profiling and tracking of juvenile offenders; more juvenile cases were being transferred into adult court and the age limits for such filings were being lowered. Here in Colorado, the juvenile offender age range runs from 10 years old to 17; offenders as young as 14 can have their cases filed in adult court to face adult-sized penalties.



It would be nice to be able to say "We've come a long way, baby" since the 1800s - - but we've traveled backward instead of forward. There may be hope on the horizon - - relatively recent research backs up the initial assumptions of the progenitors of the juvenile court systems: KIDS ARE DIFFERENT. Aside from the obvious developmental differences from adults, the brains of adolescents aren't fully formed until they reach their mid-twenties - - this lack of pre-frontal lobe formation means that they do not have full capacity for thinking their actions through to the logical conclusions, that they're predisposed to seek out high thrill/low effort activities, that they're impulsive. It's not a character flaw - - it's WHO THEY ARE.

Will the juvenile justice system listen and respond? I'm not sure that I trust it will. Here are some snapshots from the last 10 years, true stories:

a) Jason - - born to an alcoholic mother and a heroin-addicted father. His parents split up while Jason was in early adolescence. Jason lived in poverty and received little to no adult supervision; he found in his neighborhood a posse of unsupervised kids with addicted, criminal or absent parents. This posse started fighting with other kids, playing practical jokes on neighbors, whatever they could do to entertain themselves - - at one point, they set fire to a neighbor's door. Jason was 11 years old and by no means the leader of the group and by no means cognizant of what he'd done - - but he was arrested and his case was filed in District Court. Social Services, which knew of the family and didn't want to offer services because of his arson charge and the bottomless well that was his family, recommended that Jason be incarcerated in the juvenile penitentiary system....at 11 years old. No out of home placement. No probation. No in-home therapy. Thus started Jason's long career in institutions (the rest of Jason's story will be told in a subsequent post).

b) In the late 1990s, an adolescent was arrested for misdemeanor harrassment and the case was filed in District Court. The District Attorney decided that the case was serious enough to go before the juvenile court magistrate. This is what the kid did - - he hid in the bushes one day after school and clucked like a chicken at another kid who was walking by. That's it. No other facts.

c) Also in the late 1990s, another adolescent was charged with theft and his case was filed in District Court; the adolescent pled not guilty and asked for his case to go to trial - - his parents did not hire an attorney and the family's income made them ineligible for a public defender, so this juvenile ended up representing himself against a 50 year old District Attorney with a J.D. and 25 years of experience. The kid didn't do too badly - - he had a great case and he was able to pinpoint some of the state's weaknesses - - but he had no chance in those circumstances. Guilty as charged, for allegedly witnessing a friend allegedly stealing a baseball card.

d) In 2005, representatives of a local District Attorney's Office expressed their disgust with kids who "lawyer up" when their cases are filed in juvenile court - - in other words, when kids exercise their rights in the adversarial system, they and their families are viewed as troublemakers.

e) In 2005, a local judge made this statement: "If the parents can read and write, then their kid doesn't need an attorney." Imagine going to court with your child - - you might be angry at him/her for getting all of you in that situation, you might not feel confident enough to object when the D.A. makes an error, you might not speak Latin, you might not understand all the ins and outs of the legal system. You might believe that all those professionals in the room are there to look out for the best interests of your child....WRONG. To put a parent into the role of attorney in an adversarial criminal justice system is itself criminal. The D.A. has a particular role to fulfill - - to represent the case of the State. The D.A. is not looking out for the interests of the defendent in the slightest.



So, because kids don't vote or have the financial or personal power to affect the system, their rights are consistently overridden in the juvenile justice system. The adult system has hundreds of protections built in to ensure the fairness of the process - - possibly too many protections - - but your children are not similarly protected despite needing it more. This must and will change.