"Hey Barney"

As lovable fictitious, inept, insecure, and the classic alarmist character, "Barney Fife", so we have the opposite in the American barn. I've been off shooting barns the last several days and have thought of Don Knotts character on the Andy Griffith show. I thought I'd pay a little homage and metaphoric comparison to these unlikely two. The barn with its classic sense of tradition and security were often built before the families would build their houses. There was that sense of community spirit as in the case of the Amish when everyone within a 10mile radius would come for the "barn raising". (Remember "Witness"). Then on the opposite, we have the enigmatic Barney Fife, a blithering idiot of sorts but somewhat harmless. The kind of character that in someways, we've come to embrace not for his intelligence but his amiability. And who can forget the famous quote, when Barney, worried about youngsters of the day going wrong, "You know today's 8yr. olds are tomorrow's teenagers, first sign of youngsters going wrong, you've got to nip it in the bud".

And far all of Barney's immutable protestations that made no sense, this one may very well be his most prolific, "nip it in the bud". Far it certainly implies in our own lives that rather than have a mountain made out of a mole hill, are we not better off when the problem is small and bring it out in the open rather than let it fester and cause further damage??
"Walking like a one many army
Fighting with the shadows in your head
Living out the same old moment
Knowing you'd be better off instead
If you could only
Say what you need to say"
Here's to "nipping it in the bud".