Louis Roney: Hang in there!

• As our density grows, developers provide the nudges and flows that make our future take shape. There used to be a popular song called, “Stay Sweet As You Are” that I often hummed in my mind as I was growing up. The preservation of our idyllic little town was much on the minds of “Old Winter Parkers,” and should never ever be forsaken. We should not harp on this fact indefinitely but, by the same token, shouldn’t we be wary about the quality of what our future Winter Park will be? We old-timers are much concerned with the coming shapes of our lives and where we live, and present thinking becomes future reality.

• When you first start writing, it is easy to be lured into things philosophical. “Why was I born?” may occur to you. Be careful that you don’t try this out on your wife. She may be thinking the very same thing about you.

• If the “truth never lies” why aren’t lies always true? When you figure that out, let me know.

• How much money is enough money? Answer: I don’t know, I’ve never met anyone who said he had enough.

• Is marriage a natural state? Answer: It seems to me as natural as Wyoming or Vermont.

• A town in France is called Nice. I thought it meant “nice” so I went there. All I saw was a beach full of topless French maidens. Disappointed, I kept walking!

• For a long time I thought that Majorca referred to my little dog!

• In London I never went out on London Bridge because in grammar school we sang a song about its not being safe. In Avignon, I went out on the bridge and was very disappointed — no one was dancing and there wasn’t even any music!

• With his 51.4-percent majority, is Obama’s presidential objective still to “transform fundamentally the United States of America?” Does he plan to break the back of free enterprise with vigor? What will the immediate future bring? Unavoidable inflation? Economic turmoil? More loss of jobs? More taxes? More business closings? A recession? More trillions of dollars of debt? What about our natural resources — coal, oil, natural gas, iron ore, bauxite, etc.? Is high-tech going to forge ahead? What about the games being played with the military budget? The Veterans Administration debacle? Whopping pages of Obamacare that have hidden in them new taxes that will threaten medical devices, pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies, your dividends and capital gains — even your health?! What about your retirement funds after inflation? Pitting people against each other? And the questions of our relationships with China, Russia, and the Islam-o-fascist countries — more bowing down? Is another terrorist (al-Qaida, Hamas, ISIS) attack on American soil more probable now? What is our relationship to Israel? What about telling the truth about Benghazi? Where was the prexy? Was Hillary there? Guns to Mexico — the Fast and Furious fiasco?

If Obama doesn’t get his “weakening way” with Congress, will he continue his executive mandates that remain unidentified until they are carried out? Will Obama try to rewrite our Constitution or simply continue to ignore it? Will he voluntarily leave office at term’s end? Obama perhaps did tell the truth when he said, “I actually believe in redistribution.” Didn’t George Bernard Shaw say, “A government which robs Peter to pay Paul, can always depend on the support of Paul”? We may have lost the battle, but not the war. Let’s keep our heads up, and redouble our courage and resolve.

America will find its way — it always has. But now the way will be more difficult, and the time to achieve it, longer. For now with Obama still at the helm, “batten down the hatches!” and protect the America we love!

• Bicycling along the shores of Lake Sue and Lake Virginia to get to high school kept me especially alert. In the evenings, poisonous snakes warmed themselves on those brick streets and a bikes wheels could throw a snake up around ones neck.

• If a doctor prescribes marijuana to ease a patient’s pain: OK. But won’t any other way just put another monkey on our backs?