I should begin this examination by testifying that I believe Mother Nature and God are different words for the same thing. That being said, I would like to examine the hydrologic cycle as it might relate to a presence of God, and invite you to accompany me in this exploration…

Invisible as it might be to the naked eye, let us take a look at the miracle of the hydrologic cycle as a continuous circulation of water from ground to atmosphere and back to ground. Here are a few of the basic machinations as we know them…

Water from our oceans, lakes and rivers evaporates as vapor into the atmosphere. Atmospheric vapor then cools and condenses into water droplets or ice crystals, creating clouds. Water droplets in the clouds then become heavy and fall back to Earth as rain, snow, sleet, or hail. Water is then stored in various reservoirs, including oceans, lakes, rivers, glaciers and groundwater. And voila! We have our wet and wild water world…

Thanks to science, I learned all this as a freshman in college. I also noticed a handwritten note at the bottom of my report card: “Mr. Layne, perhaps you should consider changing your major to something more like, Auctioneering.”

But getting back to the subject at hand, how does a hydrologic cycle relate to a presence of God? Well, we cannot see the evaporation of water, but we can see the results, just as we can’t see God, but can stand in awe and wonder while observing the results.

So I’m starting to wonder if the presence of God is within reach of our intuitions and emotional suspicions, and yet still a leetle beyond the reach of our intellect.

My certainty in the hydrologic cycle playing a crucial role in the health of Earth’s climate and ecosystems causes me to suspect that there is an additional force, a force of God if you will,

that plays a crucial role in the health and wellbeing of our daily lives. Heck, it was a blizzard that kept me cabin bound long enough to read a book by Mark Twain that gave me a rewarding 36-year career of portraying Mark Twain in classrooms and one man shows around the globe. Some have called this delightful sojourn, “A God-Wink.”

Science and Mother Nature will eventually lead us to the discovery and explanation of a higher power, but until that happens, I shall content myself in knowing there is much more going on around us than we can see, and yet we can appreciate whatever we imagine it to be, including loving our mother, Mother Nature.

Well, I thank you for accompanying me on this scientific expedition, and I would now humbly ask you to pass me a lime for my Guinness…

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

http://www.ghostoftwain.com

An Evening with Mark Twain : https://www.airbnb.com/experiences/138314

Email: McAvoyLayne@gmail.com

“Always do right, this will gratify some

and astonish the rest.”  -Mark Twain

Allow me to introduce my pet jay, “Huckleberry,”

Who believes he is a Missionary…

Born in 2017 on the deck here at Layne Haven,

He has always believed he is part Raven,

And Lo! he’s even fond of quoting Poe!

When Huckleberry and three siblings were ready to fledge,

I spread a sleeping bag beneath their tall ledge,

Hitting the bag for Huck was a towering win,

while his sisters took it on the chin…

I remember Huck looking up as if to say,

“Wow, thanks!” And we are pals to this day…

He comes by at Happy Hour when I whistle,

“Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.”

I give him a Beer Nut, and he says, (you guessed it)

“Nevermore!”

Once he has his Happy Hour Beer Nut,

Huck thinks he’s King Tut,

Throws himself a touchdown dance,

Spikes that Beer Nut and tosses me a grateful glance…

Huckleberry faked his own death once to get my attention.

Feet up, wings out, a sight that needs no further mention,

I shouted, “Huckleberry!” and he jumped up as if to say,

“Hey pal, just in time, got any Beer Nuts for a poor jay?”

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

When space and time interface it’s a wonder to behold. I call it spatial temporal interfacing. Tangible time, time that is perceptible to the senses, is a spectacle. This perception came to me twenty-six years ago while overlooking the Lake of the Sky from the vantage point of Rifle Peak on a crystal-clear Tahoe day when I could survey almost the entire circumference of the lake. 

I fixed my focus on the distant shore and imagined I was attached by a string to the center of the Earth and could spin around the globe faster and faster until I was propelled ahead of real time. It was only for a few seconds, twenty maybe, but that was enough to cause me to tremble like a leaf on a Quaking Aspen. I then had to gather myself before taking a few unsteady steps through a heavy gravitational wave before resuming my daily run.

Fast forwarding twenty-six years, it happened again last night while I was portraying Mark Twain. For a few seconds, twenty perhaps, I was consumed by a surge of emotion that told me I was still portraying Mark Twain, but I was no longer me. And whoever I was, I was no longer in the Pacific Time Zone…

I considered sitting down and requesting a timeout to gather myself, but forged on with the flow of the story, and was able to muddle through without a second spell. Today, however, I was still on borrowed time so to speak, and probably a second or so ahead of yesterday’s real time, when a lady tried to mow me down in a crosswalk, or at least that’s how I perceived it at the time. 

Actually she didn’t see me, but I saw her, and saw what was about to happen if I did not turn myself into Bob Beamon and leap out of harm’s way, which I did. You could not have slipped an ace of spades between my behind and her bumper as she passed me by, which in terms of time might have amounted to a mere second.  In other words, had I not experienced my little time-travel episode of the day before, well, I might be pushing up turnips today where the soil needs enriching.

Not unlike Cicadas, we two-legged animals have internal clocks ticking away in our breasts. How many times have we set an alarm only to awaken one minute before it goes off? Our internal clocks are ticking like that stopwatch on 60 Minutes, synchronized by the orchestral interconnections of all living things within the harmony of the universe.

It might be safe to say that my internal clock skipped ahead a beat, and might have saved me by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin.  Should you be considering resetting your internal clock, may I humbly recommend Rifle Peak overlooking the Lake of the Sky for your synchronization.  And I look forward to seeing you, in the distant future…

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

I have a hundred-page file in my laptop just bristling with short phrases and quips that I hope might spruce up a column someday, and that file has been most helpful over the past 26 years. But today I was struck by the novel idea of writing a column backwards. That is to say, why not start a column with a random bunch of locutions, and try to weave them into a single subject matter to make a point. So what the hell, let’s splatter some haphazard words onto this page, then see if we can make some sense out of it all. Here we go…

I have found there are times when it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than it is for me to write a column that is not high-sounding rot. Cervantes reminds us, “The best end aimed at in all writing is to instruct and delight.” I don’t see it! I can write a column to instruct, or I can write a column to delight, not both!

I believe I could write a column about her, but then I am only a dwarf star in her Milky Way, who could not run a successful tattoo parlor that also sells ammo and kitty-litter. But I feel too much delicacy to speak about it…

At the moment I am feeling nothing but tears and flapdoodle, soul butter and hogwash, and lunacy leavened by a cynicism to make no end of trouble.

In the fullness of time I shall write about a topic so provocative as to produce a desire for the consolations of religion. For as everyone who lives south of the North Pole knows, a journalistic journey of a thousand miles begins with the first wrong turn, just as internet feedback loops lead to self-fulfilling prophesies.

However, it has just occurred to me with great force that whosoever commands the seas commands the trade of the world, and whosoever commands the trade of the world commands the riches of the world. The only difference between countries lies in their ability to swear musically.

What we need most now is a movement of humanity toward greater unification. But

the internet is keeping us from becoming a cultured people. Even movies are merely, “Kiss-Bang-Crash!” And internecine war is about kids on both sides getting killed. And too, in this general aura of badassery, one beautiful lady I know of is accepting remuneration as a spokeswoman for Xeomin, a brand of injectable Botox alternative that she says makes her look “less pissed off.”

Meanwhile, peace, progress and human rights remain our three inextricably linked goals. And when all is said and done, at the end of a 500-word opinion column written backwards, this bitter Earth is not so bitter after all…

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

The first piece of satire Sam Clemens published outside his brother’s paper, was also his first salvo in a lifelong crusade against frauds and humbugs. “The Dandy Frightening the Squatter” was published in the Boston Carpet Bag in 1852 when Sam was sixteen-years-old. As a lifelong humorist and social critic, he continues to speak to us today with an immediacy that transcends the ages. So let us take a moment here in 2025, and take a listen to this sixteen-year-old prophet…

A tall, brawny woodsman stood leaning against a tree which stood upon the bank of the river, gazing at some approaching object, which our readers would easily have discovered to be a steamboat. About half an hour elapsed, and the boat was moored, and the hands busily engaged in taking on wood.

Now among the many passengers on this boat, was a spruce young dandy, with a killer moustache, who seemed bent on making an impression upon the hearts of the young ladies on board, and to do this, he thought he must perform some heroic deed. Observing our squatter friend, he imagined this to be a fine opportunity to bring himself into notice; so, stepping into the cabin, he said:

“Ladies, if you wish to enjoy a good laugh, step out on the guards. I intend to frighten that gentleman into fits who stands on the bank.”

The ladies complied with the request, and our dandy drew from his bosom a formidable looking bowie-knife, and thrust it into his belt; then, taking a large horse-pistol in each hand, he seemed satisfied that all was right. Thus equipped, he strode on shore, with an air which seemed to say, “The hopes of a nation depend on me.” 

Marching up to the woodsman, he exclaimed: “You are the very man I’ve been looking for these three weeks! Say your prayers! You’ll make a capital barn door, and I shall drill the key- hole myself!”

The squatter calmly surveyed him a moment, and then, drawing back a step, he planted his huge fist directly between the eyes of his astonished antagonist, who, in a moment, was floundering in the turbid waters of the Mississippi.

Every passenger on the boat had by this time collected on the guards, and the shout that now went up from the crowd speedily restored the crest-fallen hero to his senses, and, as he was sneaking off towards the boat, he was thus accosted by his conqueror: “I say, yeou, next time yeou come around drillin’ key-holes, don’t forget to look up yer old acquaintances!”

Yes, that sixteen-year-old Samuel Clemens is shouting across the ages, trying his level best to remind us, that integrity, decency, respect and character still do matter, and now it is our turn to stand up against frauds and humbugs, and act, not violently, but act collectively…

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

I had my first and worst experience on a horse during a summer I remember only as, “The Summer of Blaze!” I was coaching swimming at the time, and there were two swimmers who were exceptionally talented, Patty & Maggie, but on this particular day they were dogging it. So I shouted to them, “Pick it up, ladies, this is not your Hilton Spa!” They stopped swimming and shouted back, “We’ll pick it up, coach, if you will ride Blaze!” To wit, I shouted back, without thinking, “Fair enough!”

Well, they did pick it up, and I was pleased, until later that afternoon, when I heard clopedy-clop-clop in the parking lot, and suddenly there was Blaze, a magnificent bareback wild stallion that Patty & Maggie had trained to run through an obstacle course at lightning speed.

Being a man of my word, albeit wearing only a swimsuit without spurs or even shoes, I climbed bravely up onto a gate, and from there boarded Blaze, who flared his nostrils in recognizing that he had a genuine turnip on his back that he was going to dispose of in a Churchill Downs minute.

Well, Patty & Maggie slapped Blaze on the rear, and we shot across that parking lot and into a pear orchard like an arrow from a crossbow. Of course I grabbed Blaze by the ears and held on for dear life as we fast approached a haybale that he had been trained to jump. So up and over we went with me hugging Blaze around the neck while he zeroed in on a low-hanging pear tree. I could see that I was about to be rudely scrapped-off by a very fast approaching pear tree, so I chose valor over defeat, and as that pear tree came into reach, I grabbed a branch with both hands, spread my legs, and let Blaze continue along his destruction derby without me. 

As I hung there counting my sins, the sound of my beating heart was broken by laughter and shouts of approval from my antagonists, the talented but devious aquanauts, Patty & Maggie, who went on to win medals in their respective events during that memorable Summer of Blaze…

I would suffer yet one more incident with a horse. I was walking down at the docks on the Island of Maui to watch the circus arrive, and a pretty lady was leading the horses off the boat onto the Island when one of her horses swung around and hit me in the chest with his rear-end, knocking me to the ground. The pretty lady shouted, “Don’t you know a horse when you see one?!” Somewhat stunned, I shouted back, “No, but I know a woman when I see one!” Without a moment’s hesitation, she shouted back, “That’s funny, you don’t look like you would!”

That hurt me, worse than the horse, but it was such a good riposte that I had to laugh, and take it like a man…   

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

Some seek power, others seek fortune, others yet seek fame, but most folks just want to lead healthy, happy lives with their family, friends and neighbors. So how about a campaign to make America kind again, MAKA, a movement to encourage thinking with the heart ahead of algorithms and artificial intelligence.

We have a literary society in Carson City, “The Never Sweats,” and our common bond is, “Love of History and Love of Community.” We meet for lunch once a month to regale in conversation about books, essays, journalism and fanciful stories. One always comes away from these gatherings feeling smarter and better off. We can’t take on any new members at present, as we have filled the Mark Twain Room at the Fox to capacity.

Incline Village boasts a similar society, OLTAC, The Old Lake Tahoe Athletic Club, whose common bond is, “The older we get the better we were.” We gather together to watch sporting events on television or play poker while smoking cigars and sipping whiskey. Our motto is, “I don’t give a _____ what you think!” Yes we do swear on occasion, but our swearing is lighthearted, musical, and carries no guile. Not unlike the Never Sweats, OLTAC is camaraderie at its best.

Having friends in both of these first-rate societies, I feel I am a better person for the association, and yet I know little about any member’s political or religious beliefs. All I know about my pals for sure is that they are cultured, well-read, well-traveled, and kind.

So I think I’ll have some red baseball caps made up that say, MAKA and give one to each of our honorable Never Sweats and OLTAC members in good faith.

I have recently changed my voter registration to No Political Party, so I can better examine everybody else’s political and religious beliefs, and not try to push my political or religious beliefs onto anybody else. Just because someone has beliefs that are not congruous to our own, does not mean we have to dislike that person, or worse yet, consider them to be an enemy. We need to lighten up, show some compassion, and exhibit some kindness toward those who do not believe as we do.

On my journey toward making America kind again, I try to imbue my life with music, instrumentals mostly, though I do like Barbara Streisand’s words, “People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.” And too, friends who lend a little light-hearted humor and warmth to my day are always appreciated. A kind word, a smile, a wave, a tip of the hat, these are gestures that carry goodwill and benevolence. Our world, our country, our community is sorely in need of more of these heartfelt gestures. 

So let us each be a living Statue of Liberty, in the spirit of that wonderful gift from France, and honor our American ideals, and liberty and democracy…

Audio: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

How I remember waking up at the Ormsby House after one of my first presentations of Mark Twain on the previous night. I recall looking out the window into that Nevada sunrise, gazing at the Capitol, and muttering to myself, “Someday, Son, you are going to regale Nevada’s legislators with some words from The Wild Humorist of the Pacific Slope. I was dreaming… 

That was 1988. Thirty-seven years and 4,000 programs later, that dream came to fruition with a call, “McAvoy, we know you’re comfortably retired, but we would ask that you address the Nevada legislature for fifteen minutes on March 20th.” 

“YES!” Kim Harris even called out her small but mighty army of Suffragists to welcome everybody as they arrived at the Capitol. It was enchanting. Our Nevada legislators were in a good humor that morning, and, well, a portion of that program I shall enter here…

“How ‘bout our Suffragists! Thanks to you ladies Nevada leads the nation! And we’re proud of you! Now you might be wonderin’ how Mark Twain got all the way from the Mississippi River to Carson City. I’m going to tell you, if I can remember…

As good fortune would have it, thanks to Mr. Lincoln’s inauguration, my brother was appointed Secretary to the silver territory…Nevada.  So, I fancied myself to be Secretary to the Secretary, and I purchased the $150 fare each on the Overland Stagecoach out of St. Joe, and out we came, at a spanking gate; with our six shooters, a deck of cards, and a six pound unabridged Webster’s dictionary. We should have left it behind. It wasn’t a good dictionary. It didn’t have any modern words in it, only obsolete words that Noah Webster used when he was a child.  For example, it defined a “carbuncle” as a kind of a rare jewel.  Humor has no place in a dictionary.”

Then, a little later along, came the litmus test…

“I covered the legislature for the Enterprise. Never have I seen a body of men with tongues so handy and information so uncertain. They could talk for a week without ever getting rid of an idea. If any one of them had been on hand when the Creator was at the point of sayin’, ‘Let there be light,’ we never would have got it. No, the Nevada legislature meets every two years for sixty days, when they ought rightly meet every sixty years for two days.”

The laughter and ovation that followed was a relief to me in light of the divisive political climate dominating our nation’s landscape. Our Nevada legislators were not taking themselves too seriously, but were good sports, and were not actually going to drown me as I had expected. In fact, I had asked that any offered honorarium go toward my funeral expenses.

Invited to dine at the Fox with the Suffragists, I was in paradise, and full to the brim with gratitude that civility is alive and well in the Great State of Nevada… 

For audio click and scroll: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO

His name was Larry, but we called him, “Louie.” Don’t ask me why. I guess it just suited him, for he seemed to like it. Three years younger than me, he was always tagging along, while keeping me busy trying to ditch him. But he was a loveable little cuss, clumsy, innocent, and quick to laugh. If he stubbed his toe, he would laugh it off, whereas, if I were to stub my toe, I would cuss like a fishmonger’s wife until it stopped hurting.

Everybody loved Louie, even four-legged and feathered friends, probably because his sympathies were so wide, and his heart was so simple and knew no guile. He was Mom’s favorite, even I knew that, and I was fine with it. Our grandmother once asked Louie what he would like to be when he grew up. Without hesitation he said, “A snowplow driver, Grandma! And I’ll give you a ride on the bumper!”

As mentioned, animals loved Louie and he loved them back. We had a pet rabbit named Thumper, who lived in a backyard patio area that was protected and comfortable. 

When Thumper died of old age it was Louie who found his limp body, and he was devastated. He wanted to bury Thumper, but also wanted our father’s advice as to where, and as father would not be home for a few hours, Louie placed our deceased Thumper temporarily in the underwear drawer of his dresser.

Well, as fate would have it, that was wash day for our mother, and she brought a load of folded clothes into our bedroom and started to put them away. I was in the kitchen enjoying some Cheerios when she opened Louie’s top drawer to deposit some clean smelling underwear,

and let out a shriek that could be heard in Carson City. She didn’t pass out, but I had to calm her nerves as she sat on the bed in stone silence.

Events like that with Thumper were almost daily occurrences with Louie. With Louie the dull times were such a rare thing as to be almost impossible. It was an adventure to grow up with him. As an adult Louie married a delightful young lady from Ireland, Goretti, and he became one of the most popular and best loved barkeepers in San Francisco. When Louie got off work at two in the morning he jumped over the bar and joined the party on the other side. Wherever Louie went from there, well, the party swung along behind, and that’s what hastened the city’s dashing barkeep to the Great Beyond.

Many of us who knew Louie have tried to use the example of his too short a life as a moderator in our personal Bacchanalian pursuits, with varying degrees of success.

Louie’s birthday is in the spring, so it’s that time of year to take a scenic hike, and lay a wildflower on my little brother’s ashes…RIP.

For audio click and scroll: https://open.spotify.com/show/7Fhv4PrH1UuwlhbnTT23zO