Jesus Sightings: People See the Lord's Face in Unusual Places

I don’t know about you, but when I’m standing in line at Walmart or Kroger, waiting to check out behind someone who’s bought half the store, I pass time by glancing through the tabloids. My favorite, since I’m not into celebrities, is The National Inquirer, which provides me with really important newsworthy events that I might otherwise miss, for instance, not only alien abductions but Jesus sightings. Yes, that’s right, Jesus sightings.

Google Images 2019

Seriously, I kid you not. People actually see Jesus, or at least his image, in the most interesting places. Take Dave Simmons, for instance. He saw the face of Jesus on a restroom stall door. It’s true. I mean, would The National Inquirer lie? In this case, no, since this particular occurrence was also reported by sources you might consider more reputable, including The Huffington Post and The Daily Mail in the U.K.

Apparently, Dave was shopping for curtain rods in an IKEA shop in Braehead, Glasgow and needed to make a stop in the restroom, where, lo and behold, he spied Jesus’s face staring back at him from the stall door. I kid you not, and Simmons claims it’s true. He said, “I went to the toilet, and there it was on the main door when I put my hand out.  I said, 'Oh, my word, it’s Jesus.'” Moreover, to squelch any doubt, Dave provided a photo he took with his Smartphone, as incontestable proof of his “Jesus sighting.” Of course, some folks say the face looks more like that of one of the tree people from Lord of the Rings than it does Jesus, but I guess that’s open to debate, and perhaps depends upon the lighting and the angle you’re standing at while looking at the face.  

Anyway, Dave isn’t alone. Through the years, there have been other sightings of the Lord’s face, most famously perhaps in a taco, a piece of toast, a frying pan, and a Walmart receipt. Plus, although it didn’t make any headlines, probably because it happened well before Smartphones or even the Internet had been invented, there was a Jesus sighting in a kudzu field in Fairburn, Georgia back when I was a little girl. It was the talk of the town for years.

Granted, Fairburn was a small town back then, so any event the least bit out of the ordinary would be rehashed for years to come, but still, this event was rather noteworthy. See, my Uncle Louie, who liked his liquor perhaps a bit too much, was relaxing in a kudzu field (Folks said he tripped, hit his head, passed out for a spell, and finally came to) when he glimpsed Jesus staring down at him from a kudzu-covered tree. Well, Uncle Louie jumped up, shouted a few “Praise-the-Lords,” and staggered home to tell folks what he’d seen there in that kudzu field. Not that anyone believed him, but that Jesus sighting, while not traumatic enough to make my uncle give up drinking, did lead to his being baptized for the third time, or maybe it was the fourth; I forget.  

Images from Google Images 2019

Silver Bullet Review: My Favorite Halloween Movie

It’s almost Halloween, and as the holiday approaches, I enjoy seeing a few good horror movies. However, the key word is “good,” because I like to think that I have discriminating taste when it comes to choices in cinematic fare, including horror movies. As a result, I don’t watch just any horror movie. For instance, I do not care for “slasher films” like the Halloween sequels (The original 1978 film, starring Jamie Lee Curtis, is a different story entirely), Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13^th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, or other splatter-fests. 

My idea of a good horror movie is one that meets the following criteria:

• Suspense that keeps you on edge
• Well-developed and likeable characters
• Good acting
• A tight script
• A believable plot (Yes, I know that horror movies don’t exactly reflect reality, at least the reality I know; nevertheless, their storylines should allow the viewer to enter that state Samuel Taylor Coleridge called “a willing suspension of disbelief.)
• No gratuitous blood, gore, or profanity.

So, that said, I am going to tell you about my all-time favorite movie for Halloween viewing: Silver Bullet. Circa 1985 and classified as a psychological horror/teen film, this film is based upon a Stephen King novella, Cycle of the Werewolf. Directed by Dan Attias, it stars, among others:

• Gary Busey as the reprobate Uncle Red
• Corey Haim as Marty Coslaw, Uncle Red’s nephew
• Megan Follows as Jane Coslaw, Uncle Red’s niece
• Everett McGill as Reverend Lester Lowe
• Terry O'Quinn as Sheriff Joe Haller
• Robin Groves as Nan Coslaw, Marty's mother and Uncle Red’s sister
• Leon Russom as Bob Coslaw, Nan’s husband and Marty and Jane’s father
• Other assorted actors and actresses, plus a good many extras
  

Silver Bullet Plot Summary

Set appropriately in October, in the small town of Tarker Mill, Maine (Aren’t all King’s stories set in Maine?), Silver Bullet is a superior horror film, mainly because of the relationship between Uncle Red, Marty, and Jane. Plus, the film has heart and even contains moments of humor. 

Jane Coslaw (Follows) narrates the story, and she sounds rather eerily like the narrator of To Kill a Mockingbird, though I’m sure they aren’t one in the same since the film based on Lee’s novel was released 23 years before Silver Bullet. Anyway, the storyline revolves around Jane’s strained relationship with her brother Marty, who is a paraplegic and confined to a wheelchair, and their parents, who Jane feels are overly protective of Marty and treat her unfairly as a result.

The siblings’ often tumultuous relationship changes for the better, however, after a series of gruesome murders occur in Tarker Mill. As the murders continue and the police get no closer to catching the perpetrator, the town establishes a curfew and cancels its annual October Fest, which includes a fireworks show. The event happens to correspond to Marty’s birthday (I think it’s his birthday), so Nan and Bob, not wanting to disappoint Marty, decide to have a cookout and invite Nan's brother (Uncle Red), who, regardless of his black-sheep standing in the family, is Marty’s favorite uncle. Come to think of it, maybe that’s why Red is Marty’s favorite uncle. He certainly isn’t boring. In fact, he’s anything but. 

Uncle Red, obviously mechanically inclined, has made Marty a souped-up wheelchair/motorcycle nicknamed the “Silver Bullet” (probably because it’s silver and fast, but also because it’s an analogy—silver bullets, as you know, kill werewolves). Uncle Red also gives Marty a large bag of fireworks, so Marty, riding in the Silver Bullet, goes zooming off into the night (As if I would go zooming off into the night with a manic on the loose) to shoot his fireworks. 

Marty stops on a bridge in the middle of the woods, where he lights some fireworks and is having a rousing good time when he’s confronted by—you guessed it—the werewolf. Marty, being resourceful however, launches a rocket, hits the werewolf directly in the eye socket, and high-tails it for home, where he shimmies up the trellis, rolls through the window, climbs into bed, pulls the covers over his head, and shivers until he falls asleep (Could you sleep after seeing a werewolf?). 

The next day Marty tells Jane that a werewolf is on the prowl in and around Tarker Mill. She tells her brother that he’s nuts, but Jane later changes her mind when she notes Reverend Lowe’s bandaged eye and finds a bloody baseball bat in the church’s garage. The kids, though, know they can’t handle a werewolf by themselves, so they solicit Uncle Red’s help. Uncle Red, despite his care-free Peter-Pan outlook on life, is a realist, so he doesn’t believe for one moment that a werewolf is terrorizing the town. Wanting to placate the kids, however, he agrees to help them kill the monster. The first step, Marty and Jane decide, is to take Jane’s silver crucifix to a master gunsmith who can melt the crucifix down and turn it into a silver bullet. The next step is to wait for the full moon¸ which appropriately is scheduled to occur on Halloween night. 

Okay, that’s all I’m going to tell you about the plot; otherwise, there’ll be no need for you to see the movie.  

Silver Bullet Rating  

Although you special-effects aficionados will probably cringe over the werewolf’s appearance (It isn’t exactly up to 2014 standards), Silver Bullet is a see-again movie. It’s suspenseful; it’s entertaining from beginning to end; the characters are likeable; the storyline, though fanciful, is believable; the acting is outstanding; it contains very little if any profanity (none that I can recall); and though it’s rated “R” for violence and gore, that violence and gore are mild compared to what you see in movies today. In fact, though the movie isn’t for very young children, I personally would not rate it R. If anything, Silver Bullet should receive a PG-13 rating or perhaps even a PG. After all, compared to recent horror movies, as well as a great many from earlier years, it’s tame. And, it’s fun to watch. 

Image Sources:

Silver Bullet Image: Google Images (2014) www.posterbobs.com

Silver Bullet Bike: ratrodbikes.com

Gary Busey: www.yourpeat.com

How to Tell When You're Getting Old

Google Images: Photographer Unknown

How do you tell when you’re no longer a spring chicken or, in other words, getting old? I have given this question the serious consideration it deserves and, in the process, which, by the way, was quite exhausting, devised a checklist by which you can measure exactly where you rank on the “chicken” scale. 

You’re no longer a spring chicken but instead an old hen or rooster when you notice certain phenomena beginning to occur; for example:

1.       You receive a compliment that is either preceded or followed by a qualifier related to age, for example:

1. You’re in really great shape for your age.
2. I hope I look as good as you when I’m your age.
3. When I’m your age, I hope I have half as much energy as you.

2. Waiters, waitresses, store clerks, and other total strangers call you “Sweetie" or "Dear."
3. People tell you that you’re “adorable” and “cute” instead of “beautiful,” “handsome,” or “sexy.”
4. Men in their mid-to-late 30’s and early 40’s ask, “How’re you today, young lady?” (Or “young man,” as the case may be)
5. The skin on your upper arms and thighs reminds you of a Bloodhound. Come to think of it, so does your face.
6. Your eyebrows disappear.
7. If you’re a woman, you no longer have to shave under your arms but find your legs need shaving twice a day.
8. If you’re a man, you have to keep trimming these black, wiry hairs not only from your nostrils but also your ears. 
9. If you’re a woman, a really stiff hair begins sprouting from your chin, and although you pluck it out or shave it off, it keeps coming back, sometimes overnight.
10. If you’re a man, your chest hair becomes virtually nonexistent.
11. Even though you’re wearing bifocals, you cannot read the fine print.
12. You clean things solely by touch.
13. You apply polish to your toenails by dabbing in their general direction and hoping at least some hits the mark.
14. You regularly receive advertisements in the mail for hearing aids, Scooter chairs, walk-in tubs, assisted-living homes, and funeral plots.
15. You wake up in the morning and realize everything hurts, but when you go to bed at night, it still hurts.
16. You look in the mirror and see your mother or father or maybe crazy Uncle Harry or eccentric Aunt Fran staring back at you.
17. You have to write down the number of the lane where you park your car at the mall or else you’ll never find it again.
18. You have to think for a while when someone asks your spouse’s age, the date of your wedding anniversary, or your children’s birthdays.
19. You can’t remember your neighbors’ first names, let alone their last names.
20. You have almost as many crowns in your mouth as real teeth, that is, if you’re lucky enough to still possess any real teeth.
21. Your little toenail is merely a nub or else has disappeared entirely.
22. You see your scalp in places where you used to see hair.
23. At night before retiring, you put the cat in the refrigerator and the left-over tuna casserole outside on the doorstep.
24. When you read this list, you recognize yourself in at least half of the items.

Why Students Can't Write: Technology and the Death of the Written Word

Though I retired from teaching five years ago and sometimes miss the challenge, as well as the interaction with students and the feeling of accomplishment I experienced when I realized that I had made a positive difference in a student’s life, I do not—in any way, shape, or form—miss grading papers. Of course, I think grading papers is the bane of every teacher’s existence. I also cannot help but think that today, in the Age of Technology, grading papers is in many ways more demanding for teachers than it was in the past. Why? Well, it’s because computers have made students both lazy and dependent, and laziness mixed with dependency creates a lethal brew, at least when it comes to writing. Then again, this “malady” is apparent in not only the declining quality of student writing but that of the general population as well.   

Don’t get me wrong. Obviously I own a computer, and I will admit that I absolutely adore its word-processing program. But then, I grew up during the Dark Ages—that technology-devoid era when people had to rely upon an instrument called a typewriter, at least they did if they did not wish to write everything by hand.  The first typewriter I ever owned was a manually operated Royal typewriter, a huge gray steel thing that weighed as much as a VW Beetle, so just imagine how thrilled I was years later when I became the proud owner of a Brother electric typewriter, which was much lighter and even had its own carrying case.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with typewriters, allow me enlighten you: typewriters, while an improvement over having to write by hand, were nothing like the word-processing programs we have today, and for several reasons.  

• First, if you were careless and created typos, either you had to use Whiteout (a thick, gooey white concoction, rather like Elmer’s Glue, but without the adhesive quality), which could leave the document looking quite messy if you weren’t extremely careful; or else you had to retype the entire page, praying all the while that you did not create yet another typo in the process.
• Second, you could not cut text, which meant if you decided to delete even one word, let along a sentence or, heaven forbid, a paragraph, you had to retype the entire document.
• Third, neither could you copy and paste; therefore, if you wished to make significant changes to whatever you were writing, again you had to retype the complete document, whether it was a memo, letter, paper, article, or 500-page manuscript.
• Fourth, typewriters did not provide their users with either Grammar Check or Spell Check. As a result, the user had to possess at least some rudimentary knowledge of spelling as well as the rules of grammar, that is, unless the user didn’t care if he or she came across as a total ignoramus to readers of the typewritten document.

And that brings me back to computers. We writers today, unlike in the past, have all these amazing tools at our disposal. We can correct typos with a keystroke or two. We can cut, copy, and paste, thus deleting or adding or even relocating entire passages and, in the process, saving ourselves valuable time. Plus, we can use Grammar Check and Spell Check to help ensure that we come across to readers as at least semi-literate. 

The problem, however, as I said in the beginning, is that even with all these amazing tools at our disposal, some writers have allowed themselves to become too dependent upon technology and, in the process, also become downright lazy. That is exactly why I would see statements like the following in student papers:

1. In the United States if we speak out against the government, we don’t have to worry about being shipped off to Suburbia. (Did the student perhaps mean Siberia?)
2. I once read that most of Egyptian inhabitants were temporary structures that were rebuilt during the next Pariah’s rein. (I think perhaps the student meant “habitats” or perhaps “habitations,” as well as “Pharaoh’s reign.”)
3. Did you also know that the Romans also invited metal horseshoes? (Invited? Invited the horseshoes where? To dinner or perhaps a movie? Then again, I think the student probably meant that the Romans “invented” metal horseshoes.)
4. Is there a way to say that I don’t expect U to whole this against the entrée paragraph that I write on my compassion? (I really don’t even know where to begin when it comes to deciphering this question. Do you?)
5. Mother Teresa was of Spinach heritage. (Spinach? Obviously, the student meant “Spanish,” but still, “Spinach”?)

Yes, technology is a time-and-labor saver. Yes, word-processing programs are amazing tools. And, yes, being a writer, I am just as dependent upon my computer as anyone else and probably far more dependent than the majority of people. However, unlike many people, I realize that a word-processing program is not infallible. It is, in fact, merely a computerized system and, therefore, inherently flawed. It does not possess eyes. It certainly does not possess a brain. And that is why it is my responsibility, as the writer, to proofread and then edit what I have written. I must ask myself if it is coherent, logical, and intelligible. Are there careless errors that might detract or else totally confuse the reader? Are the words the right words, or are they words I did not intend to use at all? Will readers understand the point I am attempting to make or wander about in a desert of incoherence and ambiguity, one that I created? Will they view me as being someone literate and at least fairly well-educated, or will readers scratch their heads and mumble, “What on Earth is this moron trying to say?”