Watch out for the rhetoric and brass bands

 My great-great grandfather Pappy Henderson celebrated the Fourth of July by building a bonfire on his place in Texas. It was often 100 degrees.

Calvin Henderson was a teenager when the Civil War started. Carried away by the rhetoric and brass bands, he signed up in a cavalry regiment. He was captured in a disastrous battle in Indian Territory and spent a winter in a prison camp in Ohio.

The prisoners, mostly Texans, lacked food and firewood. Even as an old man Pappy remembered the cold.

One night, he told a prison guard that he was walking out of the camp and would walk to Texas if the guard didn’t shoot him. He said that he was done with war, done with government, done with glorious causes. He said he’d rather be shot than freeze to death. Pappy promised himself that if he got home, he’d build a bonfire every year on the Fourth of July to remember the cold.

If Pappy were still around today, he’d tell you to watch out for the rhetoric and brass bands.

If the 20^th century proved anything, it’s that war works about as often as a lottery ticket does.