Neanderpundit

Who seems like a liberal in his ability to fly off the handle when reading something before reading it all or- for that matter- understanding any of it.

Since I don’t know hankster, and if he misunderstood, so possibly did someone else, here’s the facts, Ma’am.

As long as I am alive, in my eyes, My Father is the finest man who ever lived. His work ethic, his skills, his relationship wiht his family, friends, children, co workers, and his relationship with the Creator are all models that I attempt to follow. If I’m ever a tenth the man he was, I will be a giant among men.

My uncle Calvin, who I’ve discussed here, sits on that same shelf.

I have also been priveleged to walk in the presence of men who I consider modern day saints. Two of those men are in the category of the finest men I know.

Babe, as described below, is a man I have had, in my life, contact with for less than two or three hours. What I know of him, are tales told by the Ogwife about her relationship with him at work. And through this contact alone, meager as it has been, I place Babe in the top four or five of all the men I have known.

So “I have known finer men, but the list is damned short.” is a way of saying “this is one of the finest men I have ever known”. Dick got it. Rey got it. I suppose most people got it. What happened to Hankster that he stopped reading and decided to be offended? The world may never know.

My wife’s ex-employer’s family patriarch has expired. Actualy, he died last friday evening and his wake is tonight.

Babe served in the second world war, on the battleship North Carolina. The USS North Carolina was one of the ships shelling Iwo Jima prior to the invasion.

Babe once told me, with tears in his eyes, that he stood at the rail of the North Carolina and watched the thousands of marines dying on the meat grinder of Mount Suribachi, and he prayed, and he wept, along with hundreds of his fellow seamen.

May God hold you in the hollow of his mighty hand, Babe. You deserve the finest the afterlife has to offer. I have known finer men, but the list is damned short.