PINE NUTS – A Time for Civility
March 5, 2025 | McAvoy Lane
Back when I was in high school, I was sure Canada was one humongous hockey rink, our east coast was one humongous museum, and Old England was one humongous mausoleum… Had they awarded a diploma for certainty I would have graduated cum laude.
But now I’m older, and not as certain about things. In truth, the only thing I am sure about anymore is that we Americans are getting better at throwing bricks than laying them. We seem to have lost sight of the fact that the vestige of governing is kindness, and we should do ourselves a great service by placing kindness at the front of every political and diplomatic debate. In a country where we can be anything, let’s be kind, dammit!
Eventually, we have to come to our senses. In the old sweet days of yore, legislation was an art of compromise. In Ripley’s Believe It or Not, we are still sentient beings with connected souls, and yet in these turbid times, no country, no individual, can afford to be complacent or idle.
Nevada is different from the other 49 states. We attract gamblers and geologists mainly, and jackass rabbits. We don’t take nearly as many anti-depressants as they do in last year’s happiest place, Finland. Here, divorce is an industry, and gambling an institution. We trust everyone, but cut the cards. Yes, in the Great State of Nevada we can still do pretty much whatever we want to do, ‘long as nobody gets hurt, and we don’t frighten the horses. Oh, and as the late great David Toll might like to remind us, “Las Vegas is Mother Earth’s erogenous zone.” A doll at a Vegas gift shop can bring a hundred dollars. Yes, a john will buy it for his date, and that date will return it the next morning for cash. We call it the Vegas bank…
Meanwhile, globalization, AI, Mother Nature and migration are cooking on all four burners with only sous-chefs in the kitchen. Theodore Roosevelt warned us of the dangers of having “a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power.”
Personally, I’ve been a columnist for 45 years now, an impressionist of Mark Twain for 36, an ass for fifty, and am certain of only two things; one, the perfect union of gin and vermouth is a great and sudden glory, and two, we have no permanent enemies, except weapons of mass destruction.
Some say the sweet spot for a long life is 7,000 steps a day, and I would add with deep and abiding affection, that walking to our magnificent Lake of the Sky provides a daily sense of wonder that offers a foretaste of heaven. Reflection, nature, music, good conversation, and civility, are some of the world’s most reliable cures for heartburn at this tenuous moment in time. For the sake of us all, we are here for each other…