I’ve waved it, hung it, and ran it up a pole.   I’ve “pledged allegiance” to it — to freedoms that include the right to criticize and to think freely.  The American flag is a symbol of my government — a fabric rectangle, red, white, blue, stars and stripes — the representation, but not the foundation, on which we stand. Anyone can fly the flag and anyone can hide behind it.   

I like crows not because of James O’Barr, Brendon Lee, Carlos Castaneda or Irish cock and bull mythology.  It’s not because of the crow’s “nevermore” reputation, their association with a staged dark underworld, either — a spooky crow profile unfairly earned during the plague, when crows plucked the eyes from the dead.  As well they should.  It was good eating — food on the run.  Eyes of corpses are hassle-free…

A sleepy-eyed early-morning riser retrieving the morning paper in her bathrobe stands bow-legged, slack-mouth stunned. A driver of a Toyota van brakes abruptly to a stop — blocking an intersection. Ignoring my 7 a.m. walk through central Irvine, the group lopes down the middle of the street (one with a sideways glance). In close formation, their tongues dangling, they pass the community clubhouse, the pool, the tennis courts and the…