In my footnote to yesterday’s post about the Knights Templar, I mentioned that my grandfather was a commander in the Illinois Commandery of the Knights Templar in the United States. Since he was the boss, he could take us on tours of this building, including the basement where the pool tables were. (My two brothers and I could never beat Grandpa had pool or billiards.)
As an elementary student and a junior high school student, I was too young to understand the heritage of the organization or the goals of its current incarnation. The Knights Templar is a York Rite organization and, while it’s associated with the Freemasons now, it seems doubtful that there’s any provable direct link between the ancient Knights Templar and the modern-day Masons.
I joined DeMolay, associated with the Masons, while I was in junior high, and then had to drop out when its meetings conflicted with my Boy Scout activities to which I already had committed.
When my grandfather moved to Florida, he was disappointed in the Masonic organization there. I suspect they were a craft lodge, a level he would have already passed through and, therefore, quite different than what he was used to in Illinois.
My first crisis of conscience came when I left DeMolay for the Boy Scouts (which Grandfather approved of, reminding me I was already on that track). My second came when I was older and joined the Rosicrucian Order (a mystery school) rather than the Masons. I didn’t have time for both, and the “mysteries” seemed to be where I belonged.
Even now, I wonder. Would my life be different if I was a “Sir Knight” of the Knights Templar? I’m sure it would be. And yet, I have no excuses for the journey I chose. There are many routes leading to becoming oneself. And as Frost said, “I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.”
My novels usually focus on the transformation of the main character. That’s my main focus because I have been there over and over–as have we all.
Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of “The Sun Singer,” a hero’s journey novel.
Those of you who’ve read this blog for a while, know that I think the Supreme Court made a horrid decision in overturning Roe v Wade and further that that decision was fueled by party politics and religious beliefs rather than a serious and objective analysis of the laws and Constitution.
Yesterday, I was looking for this book because I refer to the battle multiple times in my novel in progress. General McArthur, wanting the glory of saying his troops pissed in and/or drank out of the Yalu River between North Korea and China, sent his troops north, ignoring the intel that his marines were marching into a trap near the Chosin Reservoir.
Whistlestop Bookshop opened in Gettysburg in August 1985 at 11 West Railroad St, right across from the Lincoln Diner. A quick two-and-a-half years later, in January 1988, we opened a second store in Carlisle at 152 West High Street, next door to Back Door Cafe and the Bosler Memorial Library. 
Happy 4th of July Weekend. If you live near me–and I feel safer knowing you probably don’t–then you’re having rain with more to come. After some of the news we’ve been seeing, I should probably say, “Rain, well that figures.” 
For those of you who keep wanting to make stuff like chickpea salad, I should remind you that I don’t consider that kind of thing to be food, especially for a holiday weekend. It reminds me of the kind of stuff the cooks make on the TV show “Chopped.” Look at those judges for the show and ask them if they think the chefs who compete on the show are really cooking normal food. Hmm, I don’t think the judges are that blurry in “real life.”
Speaking of food, I’m preparing Kraft Mac & Cheese of supper. I’m glad the company has finally updated their packaging to display the product as we refer to it. If they’d asked me, I would have suggested they add the words “comfort food” somewhere on the box. 
If you watched Ken Burns’ 1994 documentary “Baseball,” perhaps you felt the magic in the sport. PBS called the film, “An American epic overflowing with heroes and hopefuls, scoundrels and screwballs.” If you sense this magic at the ball field or even while watching a game on TV, perhaps you can understand why Canadian author W. P. Kinsella (1935-2016) used magical realism in Shoeless Joe, The Iowa Baseball Confederacy, and his later novel Butterfly Winter.
The spirit of the magic is aptly summed up in the New York Times review of Shoeless Joe that includes the following excerpt that appeared after a character was discovered to have been lying about his baseball experience: “I imagine Eddie Scissons has decided, ‘If I can’t have what I want most in life, then I’ll pretend I had it in the past, and talk about it and live it and relive it until it is real and solid and I can hold it to my heart like a precious child. Once I’ve experienced it so completely, no one can ever take it away from me.'”
Wikipedia says,” The Iowa Baseball Confederacy (1986) another book blending fantasy and magical realism, recounts an epic baseball game a minor league team played against the 1908 World Champion Chicago Cubs” and Butterfly Winter as “The story of Julio and Esteban Pimental, twins whose divine destiny for baseball begins with games of catch in the womb, the novel marks a return to form, combining his long-held passions of baseball and magical realism.”
I’m picky when it comes to gumbo. I prefer cajun to creole and okra to filé powder. Yet, for today’s post, it’s a great symbol for a tasty mix. You might need some antacids if you’re not used to it.
I’ve just finished re-reading The Zoo Keeper’s Wife. I’m impressed by the willingness of people to fight, hide Jews who are escaping from the Ghetto, and risk their lives sabotaging the Nazis. I hope that if Americans face similar circumstances, they will be as strong as the people in Warsaw. (And Ukraine, of course.)
This Facebook meme is especially apt this week. Speaking of Facebook, and I’d rather not, it still hasn’t addressed the software fault on my author’s page. I have unpublished it, and it will go away forever if the fault isn’t fixed before the count-down-to-deletion ends. (13 days from the day I unpublished it.) Some people say that Facebook doesn’t need support because everyday users aren’t their customers. I beg to differ inasmuch as the company wants me to see my page as a business, one where I spend money to advertise my books and “boost” posts for wider audiences.
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The first large plane I flew on was the DC-8. I flew it between Luxembourg and New York City (with a brief stop in Iceland) and between Manilla and California. Both flights must have been smooth because my main memory was being asleep for most of both trips except when the flight attendants woke me up to eat again and again.
My favorite plane was the L-1011 (TriStar), very technologically advanced when it appeared in 1972, even though it certainly had a lot of people in that center section where the windows seemed several miles away. I think these were retired much too soon. Delta and Eastern flew these, so I saw a fair number of them.
The strangest plane I flew on was the Grumman HU-16 Albatross. These were used by the Navy and Air Force for search and rescue operations and could be configured as a seaplane, though the one I flew on in the Philippines was land-based. Jimmy Buffett flew the seaplane.
The Albatross typically carried 10 passengers. The Grumman C-1 Trader typically carried nine, though its main role in the 1960s and 1970s was bringing mail and/or flag-level staff to aircraft carriers. While it was capable of taking off from a carrier without using the catapult, the time I flew between the USS Ranger and Da Nang, we were catapulted off. That was a bit rougher than a DC-9 taking off from Tallahassee.
The DC-3 I flew on in the Boy Scouts seemed rather ancient and it was for a special trip out of the Tallahassee airport down to the coast and back. This would have been in the late 1950s. My biggest surprise was seeing the Gulf of Mexico right after we took off. Oddly enough, a few airlines and cargo operators are still flying this 1935 aircraft.
Today’s special event (let’s help Malcolm mow his yard) has been canceled due to hot weather. Even CNN, which normally stays quiet about news it doesn’t like, posted numerous stories about the heat, noting among other things that heat will be bad in the South. Duh. Apparently, the weather system is centered around Mempis. Those of us who live in Georgia think all bad weather begins in Memphis.
Suffice it to say, I ended up a Leo, and while it’s been nice being the best of the sun signs, I’d trade away all that glory to have a winter birthday. A little-known fact about my reign as a Leo is that I’m the one who posed for the MGM logo. (My stage name was “Tanner” to help the family duck all the taxes on royalties.)
Malcolm's Round Table 