Charlie At 75…Is This The Face of The Contrite & The Ailing?
Photo
THELMA AND LOUISE PART II
Hardly, huh?
Have you noticed a pattern with most career criminals/murderers?
‘Cause I have.
They seem to thrive, to blossom and grow, instead of shrink, weaken or diminish from the destructive energy they have wrought during and after their crimes.
I had mentioned in passing to my Mother, you know, the wife of the cop, that yesterday it was The Soul’s birthday, and as wives of cops do, she nodded in disgust and as usual conversations go with this upright Mother of mine, humoured me as she prayed for the conversation to end.
I said that I had no plans to talk about it on TLB2 and she said, “Good, because it’s blogs like yours which give this creep his fame!”
I stared at her, gulped, hovered over by the coffee maker for a minute as I poured another mug full, my mind now drawing a blank, in terms of a lofty retort.
The statement, in some fashion, was true enough. But not a complete one.
After losing my deer-in-the–headlights shock at what she said, I said, “No, Mom, not anymore than a blog spot on Hitler gives Neo-Nazis any more fame. Some topics just have to be discussed, for if only to remind others not to repeat history.”
But, before this familial mini-debate began, I had already decided to let this date slide by. I pretty much had made my mind up to not celebrate the birthday of a man who was convicted of stealing other peoples’ birthdays.
‘Nuf said.
I left my Mom to her baking and her black & white world while I headed back to my house, and my lap top, and my oh so grey existence.
I, of course, had to admit, that on some level, my Mom was right, and that, of course, miffed me in ways I cannot fully describe here, but I let the dust settle on that annoying fact, until I got a “Hi MsBurb” from THELMA AND LOUISE PART II.
“Hi, right back at ya!” I said, and thought, oh yeah, it’s been a while. I’ll trod on over to that informative site and see what’s up.
And so I did. And it was then that I saw it. The photo. That photo.
Of a man, the face of evil for many, the harmless hippie guru to some, the mystery of the Unknown yet to others, and to me, Soul at 75.
And what a photo is was too! This guy looked like Papa Hemingway meets John Houston! Neatly groomed with all that astute-looking white/grey hair, an artsy-fartsy scarf and those Hollywood shades. If I didn’t know better, this little dude looked like he had just come from a photo shoot off the coast of Majorca!
This could have been the photo of someone important and influential instead of someone so very infamous.
Was this the face of Evil? Not really, or at least, not what you’d expect.
Was this the face of a contrite, withering, aging old man, who now after decades of punishment is but a bleak blemish on the face of Life, suffering from the ravages of guilt and self-loathing? Hardly.
Debra Tate looks worse than Charlie today, and in some ways Charlie today looks better than he did in ‘69! The aging is evident, the anger more pronounced but a survivor’s spirit more powerful now than ever before.
While time has been anything but good to the Tate-LaBianca killers, all of whom are on average a decade younger than their leader,
Bobby, Susan, Pat, Tex, Leslie, and Linda, have definitely been physically and mentally wrecked by their past misdeeds.
Charlie, on the other hand, seems to have thrived, to have grown, to have blossomed in his life-long career as a professional convict, no signs of guilt, no stresses, no strains, just a man in his later years confident now more than ever, that the world in which he has always lived has always been right, for him. At least.
Must be nice to be that confident, I said jealously to myself.
The victims of those nights of murders have received Justice in the decades long withering of the killers themselves, but if they were ever seeking Justice from the man who lead the killers to kill, that Justice, as evidenced by this photo today, will never come to pass.
This is where man’s ability to place judgment on another man, beyond the realm of law, must be left to a higher Being, that maybe in this Life, the confident criminal is left to thrive. Maybe in the next, who knows.
If there is such a thing as a parallel universe, the one in which Charlie lives must be a perfect example to our own. What is considered wrong in ours, must not be wrong in his, and if we hope to see the ravages of our punishment on a man who lives not in our world, our efforts will continually be in vain.
If any of you, including me, were holding our breath for that punishment to show, we better exhale because that day, if it’s not here now, will never be.
I said that I had no plans to talk about it on TLB2 and she said, “Good, because it’s blogs like yours which give this creep his fame!”
I stared at her, gulped, hovered over by the coffee maker for a minute as I poured another mug full, my mind now drawing a blank, in terms of a lofty retort.
The statement, in some fashion, was true enough. But not a complete one.
After losing my deer-in-the–headlights shock at what she said, I said, “No, Mom, not anymore than a blog spot on Hitler gives Neo-Nazis any more fame. Some topics just have to be discussed, for if only to remind others not to repeat history.”
But, before this familial mini-debate began, I had already decided to let this date slide by. I pretty much had made my mind up to not celebrate the birthday of a man who was convicted of stealing other peoples’ birthdays.
‘Nuf said.
I left my Mom to her baking and her black & white world while I headed back to my house, and my lap top, and my oh so grey existence.
I, of course, had to admit, that on some level, my Mom was right, and that, of course, miffed me in ways I cannot fully describe here, but I let the dust settle on that annoying fact, until I got a “Hi MsBurb” from THELMA AND LOUISE PART II.
“Hi, right back at ya!” I said, and thought, oh yeah, it’s been a while. I’ll trod on over to that informative site and see what’s up.
And so I did. And it was then that I saw it. The photo. That photo.
Of a man, the face of evil for many, the harmless hippie guru to some, the mystery of the Unknown yet to others, and to me, Soul at 75.
And what a photo is was too! This guy looked like Papa Hemingway meets John Houston! Neatly groomed with all that astute-looking white/grey hair, an artsy-fartsy scarf and those Hollywood shades. If I didn’t know better, this little dude looked like he had just come from a photo shoot off the coast of Majorca!
This could have been the photo of someone important and influential instead of someone so very infamous.
Was this the face of Evil? Not really, or at least, not what you’d expect.
Was this the face of a contrite, withering, aging old man, who now after decades of punishment is but a bleak blemish on the face of Life, suffering from the ravages of guilt and self-loathing? Hardly.
Debra Tate looks worse than Charlie today, and in some ways Charlie today looks better than he did in ‘69! The aging is evident, the anger more pronounced but a survivor’s spirit more powerful now than ever before.
While time has been anything but good to the Tate-LaBianca killers, all of whom are on average a decade younger than their leader,
Bobby, Susan, Pat, Tex, Leslie, and Linda, have definitely been physically and mentally wrecked by their past misdeeds. Charlie, on the other hand, seems to have thrived, to have grown, to have blossomed in his life-long career as a professional convict, no signs of guilt, no stresses, no strains, just a man in his later years confident now more than ever, that the world in which he has always lived has always been right, for him. At least.
Must be nice to be that confident, I said jealously to myself.
The victims of those nights of murders have received Justice in the decades long withering of the killers themselves, but if they were ever seeking Justice from the man who lead the killers to kill, that Justice, as evidenced by this photo today, will never come to pass.
This is where man’s ability to place judgment on another man, beyond the realm of law, must be left to a higher Being, that maybe in this Life, the confident criminal is left to thrive. Maybe in the next, who knows.
If there is such a thing as a parallel universe, the one in which Charlie lives must be a perfect example to our own. What is considered wrong in ours, must not be wrong in his, and if we hope to see the ravages of our punishment on a man who lives not in our world, our efforts will continually be in vain.
If any of you, including me, were holding our breath for that punishment to show, we better exhale because that day, if it’s not here now, will never be.
Happy Heavenly Birthdays This Year To:
Gary Allen Hinman
Steven Earl Parent
Thomas John Kummer “Jay Sebring”
Wojiciech”Voytek” Frykowski
Abigail Anne “Gibby” Folger
Sharon Marie (Tate) Polanski
Paul Richard Polanski
Pasqualino Antonio "Leno" LaBianca
Rosemary (nee' Ruth Katherine Elliott/Rosemary Harmon,Struthers) LaBianca
Donald Jerome “Shorty” Shea
Thomas John Kummer “Jay Sebring”
Wojiciech”Voytek” Frykowski
Abigail Anne “Gibby” Folger
Sharon Marie (Tate) Polanski
Paul Richard Polanski
Pasqualino Antonio "Leno" LaBianca
Rosemary (nee' Ruth Katherine Elliott/Rosemary Harmon,Struthers) LaBianca
Donald Jerome “Shorty” Shea
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