Spring reading
Rob Price

Something amazing happened last week.

The sun came out, temperatures soared and nature popped.

In my own backyard, the pear tree started greening; buds swelled on the verbena; even the dogwood, a tree that typically looks bedraggled this time of year, appeared strong and healthy and ready to show off some rich colors.

Birds are going crazy. When they're not flying around bearing twigs in their beaks for nests, they're chasing each other in a wild spring passion. I watched a pair of doves on my neighbor's roof doing something in public that people would be arrested for. "Have at it," I told them.

Spring's lushness reached its apex midway through the week, when my neighbors' daughter arrived home for a visit, bearing three babies. Two boys and a girl - and as I drove home from work, the happy mother was sitting on their front porch with her mother and a friend from across the street, each woman holding a baby in her lap, feeding it from a bottle.

I had been expecting a visit from the babies for some time, so I walked over for a short visit and took a picture of the scene. Then I walked home and showed the photo to my wife, who immediately dropped what she was doing to make her own visit. "Come with me," she ordered, and I said, "But I've already seen the babies," to which she replied, "Don't be an ass." So I walked down again to make a more detailed inspection.

In the midst of all this abundance, my neighbor gave me a book, explaining that he was culling his bookcases to make room for more books. The book he gave me is a heavy volume, with a heavy sounding name: "American Theocracy." Its author is a political analyst named Kevin Phillips, a man whose earlier - much earlier - work I actually read when I was in college. In those days, Phillips was a promoter of everything Republican; now he has turned on the party he used to celebrate, heaping piles of criticism on the modern GOP.

The gist of "American Theocracy," as I understand it, asserts Republican Party leaders - the party has dominated the White House over the past 40 years - have presided over three dangerous developments: the rise of a radical Christian community that has inserted itself in government and politics; the creation of a kind of "petro-imperialism" that has turned the country's military into a "global oil protection force"; and an astonishing increase in the country's debt load, ranging from the national government's $8 trillion debt to consumer's billions of credit card and mortgage debt.

In short, "American Theocracy" seems just like the sort of book to confirm my vague suspicion the country is headed for disaster. I started leaning in this direction on Sept. 11 , 2001, and I haven't seen much since then to make me think otherwise. So it will be fun to read "American Theocracy"; no doubt I will be saying things over the next few weeks like "I couldn't have put that any better."

It seems a shame to be full of gloomy premonitions when, at the same time, I am surrounded with a blooming spring. The sensible - and optimistic - thought is, even though national and world events seem dire, the return of spring reminds us of nature's eternal truths. One of which is, life goes on.

Of course, another of nature's eternal truths is, bad stuff happens. Great Depressions happen. World Wars happen. People do things that create all kinds of disasters, from failing to maintain levies in New Orleans to allowing carbon emissions to threaten the worldwide environment.

On the other hand, while I wait for terrible events to overtake us, there are some important things I need to do. My wife wants me to buy a truck load of red mulch for the backyard. A friend dropped off some good river rocks; we will use them to rebuild a rock wall around a flower garden. I also need to call a roofer to fix a leak on a portion of the roof, and inside the house, I need to paint the walls of the front room.

And, down the street, there are three new babies who need to be welcomed into the world.