MackDAmes

“You need a cup o’ tea”

It’s midday Friday at work, and three men came to class today. Two are math students, and the third is their erstwhile tutor. I feel extra intelligent for using the word “erstwhile,” but then I’m uneasy about it, wondering if it means what I think it does.

Okay, I looked up the definition of “erstwhile,” and with a bit of digging, I came to the synonym, “sometime,” which is the feeling I was aiming for. I probably should have used “sometime” instead, but I couldn’t think of it when I wrote that sentence. All that came to mind was “erstwhile.” Sigh. Way to mansplain, Mack. Sheesh.

The Erstwhile Tutor, or ET, for short, works through math problems with B and D. ET doesn’t hold great mathematical knowledge for instruction, per se, but he’s good at helping others process their work. All three are good conversationalists, for the most part, and they get along well with each other. The drawback to this is that they frequently spend more time talking and less time mathing.

ET and B are soft-spoken individuals who watch their language carefully, which is rare where I work. Penal institutions are not known for guarded tongues, and the f-bomb is employed where “valley girls” are infamous for “like.” D is from Cali-f-bomb-fornia, and he falls into the category of using that bomb in place of “like,” “um,” “uh,” or any other filler word. I get on his case about it lightheartedly, but I also want him to learn to filter it.

Today, I offered cups of tea to the men. I happened to have some paper cups, tea bags, and stirrers in my classroom, and I have a hot pot. I added fresh water to the pot, heated it, and they enjoyed the drinks. They all said it relaxed them. I’m glad to share.

As they drank, D pressed me for details about a meeting I attended this morning that affected him. All I could remember was that the result was favorable for him and that no one said anything negative about him. He kept asking for more information, insisting that I knew more, but since I hadn’t taken notes at the time, I repeated my answer to him. He asked again, and I became a little annoyed. At that point, ET said, “You need a cup o’ tea!”

We all laughed. I said, “No, thank you. I prefer coffee, and I’ve already had mine for today. I don’t like tea.” What I really meant was that I don’t like the tea available, but I kept that to myself.

A chorus of dismay said, “You don’t like tea?? What’s wrong with you?”

I laughed again.

“You need tea, Mack. It’ll calm you down!”

Again, I just laughed. “I’m calm. Thanks.” Then I told D once more that the outcome of the meeting was positive for him and that all comments about him were positive. He finally accepted my answer and moved on with his day.

That was 90 minutes ago. Since then, these men have completed about twenty minutes of math work and seventy minutes of meandering conversation. I read this to them before they left the room, and they got a kick out of it. There were some protestations of, “We did some geography!” and “That’s not all we did!” But they also acknowledged that the day had passed less productively than usual. They bid me adieu and promised to study more next week.

I just laughed and nodded. Maybe I should have a cup o’ tea.

Vocal on Vocal

For the last three or four years, I have been publishing essays, short stories, and poems on a website called vocal.media. I can no longer remember how I stumbled across the site, but once I found it, I was hooked. I discovered a place where amateur or hobbyist writers like me could respond to site writing challenges or simply write and post to an available category, and we would receive feedback, recognition, financial awards, or nothing at all.

My initial goal was to win a writing challenge. The prizes range from $200 to $600 per contest, and I submitted one or two works that I believed stood a chance. Then I saw my competition. Ha! I returned to my own lane with a healthy dose of humble pie.

I didn’t stop contributing to writing challenges, but I stopped expecting to win. Instead, I focused on enjoying the process. Another writer ran his own challenges for a time, and I won one of those. The prize was peanuts by comparison, but the prestige of winning outshone the monetary gain. Then, I discovered that Vocal awards monthly winners of another type: Top Story by category.

On an occasion when I wrote about a friend dying unexpectedly, I was shocked to open the website a day later and find my essay labeled “Top Story” by the editors. I had submitted my piece to the Men category and tagged it for grief, loss, and friendship, and the Vocal Media editors decided it deserved the recognition and $5 award for top story for that month. All I did was write what was on my heart.

I have earned at least one more Top Story since then, and I hope to earn more, not because I esteem my writing so highly, but because I cannot withdraw my earnings from their site until they reach at least $20. Hahaha.

However, not everything I find on Vocal is pleasant. There are some writers whose material has interested me, so I’ve followed them for a year or two. Two of them, in particular, are prolific, to put it mildly. Of those, one has become noticeably political in the past year, and there is no moderation in his mind. He is slow to listen, quick to speak, and he rushes to judgment. Yesterday, I stopped following his account. It became more than I needed to ingest.

He is articulate, but he is part of a worldview that I find clouded with the smoke of projection. Everything that his Party has done in recent years by way of media propagandism, denying freedom of speech to those who disagree, arresting political opponents, defrauding the American taxpayers out of billions of dollars to the benefit of illegal immigrants, and cheating victims of violent crimes at the hands of illegal immigrants by refusing to prosecute the offenders, is now overlooked. Instead, he points his finger at those who try to bring back law and order, and he excuses the lawless.

The very tyranny that he decries is, in fact, the worldview he espouses. He is not alone on Vocal. In truth, I am in the minority there. To be vocal on Vocal is risky, for the editors walk with him. I read a poem by another writer yesterday, and this is what I said in response:

“There is tyranny in America. I see it every day. It’s on social media. It’s in the news. It clutters the writing sites. Affirmations of tyranny flood comment sections. “Tyranny! Fascism! No Kings! Down with Dictators!” Anguished shouts and tears of fear pour forth in waves.

“The irony is that the loudest voices are the ones committing the tyranny.

“In 2020, our current Senate Minority Leader condemned President Trump for not removing the then-dictator of Venezuela, Nicholas Maduro, from power. In 2024, the Democrat Party put a 24 million dollar bounty on the head of Nicholas Maduro, demanding that someone remove him from office. They declared that he “was not the legitimate president” of Venezuela. When President Trump removed Maduro from power a couple of weeks ago, that same politician and his fellow Democrats condemned Trump for doing it. Only Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania stood up to his fellow Dems to point out their hypocrisy, but to no avail. Because it was Trump who did it, they refused to say it was a good move.

“You see the world through the filter of left-wing media, but you express yourself with skill.

“Two examples of what I mean about the filter I believe you use are the reason for removing Maduro and the tragic death of the woman in Minneapolis.

“The removal of Maduro has less to do with the so-called stealing of Venezuela’s resources and much more to do with preventing rival nations from accessing them. China, for example, has relied heavily on Venezuelan oil to prop up its plans to overthrow Taiwan violently. Maduro’s cooperation with China has been removed, and China has had to back away from those plans. If you look beyond the limited view of the American media, you can begin seeing the long game of what an America-first politician and globalist businessman Donald Trump is playing. It’s very rare to have a president who holds both positions simultaneously. He sees the long game better than any president since Teddy Roosevelt, but while the American media — left and right — waxes eloquent about national and local politics, he’s looking to put this country on a solid footing for the next hundred years.

“Secondly, the tragic shooting in Minneapolis. As the footage has revealed, the woman who “sat in her car” had actually been told to exit her car and refused, and then she hit the gas and drove over the officer, who then shot her in self-defense. I know that you may disagree with his actions at all points, but if I break into your home and attack you with a machete, you are justified in defending yourself with anything and everything, especially if you have warned me to stop and get out. Assault with a deadly weapon is FA. Self-defense is FO. Crude way to say it, perhaps, but it’s to the point. She was not required to be there. She should not have been there. Interfering with law enforcement NEVER ends well. My classes are full of students who have learned that lesson.

“The tyranny in America is not coming from Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. It’s not coming from the Trump administration. The tyranny in America is coming from everyone who is refusing to recognize that laws must be obeyed, that law enforcement must not be interfered with, and that allowing ten million illegal immigrants into America during the Biden administration and giving them taxpayer-funded housing, EBT, healthcare, jobs, CDLs, and turning a blind eye to their r@pes, m*rders, drunk driving, and all the rest, is okay and should be tolerated. That is tyranny.”

I considered submitting this as its own essay, but I decided against it. Vocal does not need another rant. I’ll keep mine to my own site. I went to the author’s page today to copy and paste this, and he thanked me for “being moved enough to respond” to his poem. I don’t and won’t follow this author, but at least he has more intellectual honesty than the first fellow.

I am not an admirer of Donald Trump, the man. He is deeply flawed. However, I have observed too many instances of his interest in America’s long-term success to believe that he is only out for himself as president. As a businessman, he must act as a globalist, but as president, he puts this country first. That provides him with better strategic thinking than any other American politician in recent history, and when Americans get over who he is, they, too, can see how he is maneuvering this country for a bright future. Unfortunately, most current Representatives and Senators of both parties are in the job for themselves and the money the lobbyists provide.

Between the corruption of Congress and the unreasonable hatred of Donald Trump by too many deluded Americans, tyranny has come to America through the Democrat Party and the Socialists they have enabled to immigrate illegally. God have mercy on America, for He is our only hope.

Harmless Mistake or Intentional Harm?

The whole idea of “think before you speak” was hammered into my head growing up. It didn’t always work, but it saved me from many embarrassing moments. In twenty-first century America, “think before you speak” doesn’t seem to do any good. People neither pay attention to the idea nor follow the advice. The results can be comical, or they can leave you wondering how long the light has been on with no one at home.

It may seem like too much of a jump in reasoning for you to link this to political issues, but the lack of awareness demonstrated daily by public figures in America never fails to astound me. In a very recent event, one political party put a twenty-five-million-dollar bounty on the head of a dictator of a foreign country. That dictator had lost the most recent election, but he had used the military to stay in power. In his corruption, he bankrupted his once-prosperous nation, and this particular American political party placed a bounty on his head to seek his arrest.

Just a few days ago, the leader of the opposite political party in America sent American military forces into that dictator’s country and arrested the man and his wife, leaving the foreign nation free of the dictatorial rule for the first time in decades. The citizens of that nation are rejoicing and praising the Americans who freed them. But the political party that put a bounty on the dicator’s head? They are not cheering for his capture. They are furious that their political opponents captured him, so they are denouncing his capture and insisting that he be returned to power as a dictator. What a head-scratching, face-palming moment! They got the result they wanted, but since it was achieved by an opponent, they are enraged that he’s the one who accomplished it. Instead of rejoicing with the citizens of the foreign nation, they are lecturing those citizens and saying that the country should reinstall the crook.

In this case, I am calling them stupid. They are acting like spoiled children who ask for a treat, receive a generic brand version of it, and refuse to accept it because it’s not the name-brand one. The petulance is obvious to all observers, and there will be consequences for this foolishness, but the immediate result is that adults display childishness as acceptable behavior, and that sets a troubling example for a nation already struggling to find its moral compass. Childish, churlish behavior by adults leads to violence in the public square. It is the same boorishness that led to the murder of Charlie Kirk on September 10, 2025, preceded by the assassination attempt on candidate Donald Trump in July 2024. Accepting violence while preaching temperance in speech and behavior for others, yet advocating for unruliness in their own followers, these adults are like the meme above: Coyly pretending they said the “Mississippi,” and when called on it, they defend themselves with “river” or “state,” depending on which one their opponent accuses them of saying. In such a manner, they try to wriggle off the hook of accountability, while knowing very well which one they meant.

So, is it a harmless mistake or intentional harm?

Frigid

It’s a frigid day. A hat and coat rest on the rack by the library door, and the few sounds disrupting my peace are the ticks of the clock behind me and the shuffling of papers on a desk fifteen feet away. The door opens, and a grumpy inmate scuttles in, stomping snow off his boots and grousing at everyone who’ll listen that he should be allowed to watch YouTube videos and waste his time while others are trying to study. I threw him out ten minutes ago for doing that.

He’s not a bad sort, as inmates go, but he’s short-sighted, narrow-minded, and fixated on the idea that the world owes him, even though he committed a crime that landed him here. Any attempt to hold the line with him becomes an existential threat to his humanity. He’ll acknowledge with his mouth that I treat all with equity and justice, but since others in authority here don’t, then we’re all lumped into the same crap pot. I’d like to feel some charity toward him for seeing we’re not all alike, but he’s still a cranky grouch. It’s a common theme around here.

A colleague retired a few days ago, and he got all choked up about this being the “best job I’ve ever had, hands down.” He’d been here more than two decades. Maybe if I’d been in his shoes, I would say the same thing, in the same way. He was never tied to a classroom, and he never had to run a dorm or a cell block. He was a middle-management kind of guy, tying up loose ends, making everyone’s day. The buck never stopped with him. Even when he was a less-than-stellar supervisor, which he certainly was, the buck went further up the food chain. On a personal level, we got on pretty well, but professionally, I was happy to bid him farewell. The supervisor before him fought for us. He rarely did, and I spent years feeling unsupported or stabbed in the back. He’s been gone two days, and work life’s no better. Seriously. Makes me wanna puke.

On this frigid day, the only people making me want to be here are the officers I had hoped to work with full-time when another friend retired a few months ago. Instead, the other teachers and I have to work on a rotation, creating more work for us and greater confusion for the inmates. Management does such a great job screwing up good things. Situation Normal, All Fouled Up.

Before I left home, I donned a shirt, my new alumni sweatshirt, my work vest (to cover up the alumni design that someone at work would have a problem with), and my hand-warmer half-gloves. I’m still shivering. I’ve even kept my cap on. The realization that my regular classroom isn’t any warmer than the chillbox I’m in now isn’t filling me with great desire to complete my workday. I’m tempted to call out the remainder and go home early. I’m truly disinterested in working this afternoon. I’d rather start with a fresh week. I want to be anywhere but this place.

Who am I trying to convince? I’ve already made my plans. Tomorrow’s a big day for me. It’ll be my first time volunteering with a political campaign, as I work with another man doing voter registration in support of Robert “Bobby” Charles for Governor. It’ll be frigid tomorrow, too, and no guarantee of friendlier people. But the climate here has become so toxic that I need an escape. There’s frigid air, and there’s frigid there. Which would you prefer?

Baseball and Politics

It’s the end of May 2023 and my son’s junior varsity baseball team is nearing the end of its season. I’ve enjoyed watching him play in his freshman season. He’s developing into a decent first baseman, though pitching remains his strongpoint. He’s a lefty, which makes him even more valuable to the team. He also happens to be a good kid, which should make a bigger difference.

But politics of sports teams in high school are similar to the politics of nations and workplaces. You have to know the right people if you want the best treatment. And if you happen to value civility and kindness over winning-at-all-costs, you must be prepared for uncivility of the nastiest types.

So it was a few nights ago and a high school baseball game when the temperature was in the 40s and everyone shivered under blankets and in winter coats. The boys on the diamond played with the intensity of the Chicago Cubs trying to win their first World Series in over 100 years, and when one young man missed a pop-up because an opposing fan yelled at the crucial moment to distract him, and said young man yelled out “Fuck!” in frustration, he knew that the umpire had every right to eject him from the game. He immediately apologized to the man, who allowed him his mistake. Said OPPOSING FAN then started yelling at the umpire to throw the kid off the field.

The harassment of that player continued for several innings. When he uttered a much quieter epithet later in the game that the fan heard but not the ump, the fan ran to the fence and harangued the umpire again. Then he turned to the people next to him and said, “You better believe I’m calling his school tomorrow to tell them what I think.”

I did him one better. I took his photo and emailed it to the principal of his kid’s school with an explanation of the situation. Now. I’m a political conservative and voted for Trump twice. At the moment, I’m pulling for DeSantis or Tim Scott, but I’ll vote for the Republican nominee in 2024, but one of the two men harassing that poor kid all game was a proud Trump 2024 fan. Lest any pro-Dem or anti-Trump fans get all proud of yourselves, I can assure you that plenty of fans like you were on that kid’s case, too.

Politics have led this country down a path of tremendous incivility. Enough so that grown men in the stands at a kids’ baseball game get bent out of shape for a kid using a word that they use, too. How about letting baseball be baseball? Let the kids play, and get your self-righteous, high-and-mighty attitudes out of the way?