Rolling Stones

  It was my first day of kindergarten. My mom walked me into the strange room, filled with kids, and introduces me to the teacher. She smiled and took me over to see the class turtle. He was a cute little guy with red marks on the side of his neck. I don’t remember his name, but I thought he smiled at me. When I turned around, my mom was gone! I was trapped here with all of those strange kids.

    There was a little blonde girl. I don’t remember her name, but she said I was her boyfriend. We held hands and played together. She was nice. She made me feel comfortable in my new world. I still have a thing for little blonde girls. Namely, Laura Gail. She’s my best friend now. She makes me feel comfortable wherever I am, too. She’s also very nice. Most of the time.

    The other thing I remember is nap time. We all had our own little mat to lay down on during nap time. I remember sleeping well, and not wanting to get up when it was time. I’m still a big fan of naps, whenever I can get them.    

    When you’re small, your world is small. You play with your little toys, and you can make them do whatever you like. They can fly, run faster than lightning, or swim without coming up for air. Your heroes always save the day, and the bad guy is always defeated. Your world is whatever you want to make of it.

    Growing up was the worst decision I ever made. Once you make it, though, there’s no turning back. All of the “grown up” things you want come with a price. You want to spend money on whatever you want. No parents telling you “you don’t need that”. So you get a job, and earn your own money. That’s all well and good, until you surround yourself with things you get to pay for on a daily, monthly, and yearly basis. 

    You want to stay up as late as you want and do whatever you want. No parent to say “you have to get up for school in the morning”. Now that you have a job, that’s not too easy to get away with. Sure, you can stay out all night if you want. In the morning, however, that job is still there, waiting. You can’t buy “what you want” without it, so here we go. Exhausted and tired, you learn to go to bed at a decent hour. 

    Chocolate cake at eleven o’clock at night? Heck, yeah! You can do that, too. Man, being a grown up is awesome! No parent to say “No. It’ll give you a tummy-ache in the morning.” You may get away with it for a few years, but eventually your metabolism no longer cooperates with your taste buds. Then you end up feeling tired, miserable, and sick at work the next day. Growing up. It’s a devilish thing.

     I envy my daughter, Candice, and my grandson, Sammy. The former turns thirty-eight on the nineteenth, and the latter turns five on the eighteenth. They both still have the energy and imagination to play, to laugh and to do all of the things they love to the utmost. They’re still learning. They’re still in their own little worlds, just in different ways. I love when I get to play with both of them, and they let me into their world. I’m a certified member of the Old Man Club, but they still include me in their adventures, and I appreciate it. Watching your kids, and grandkids, learn, grow and have fun is one of the few benefits in growing up. They make me feel young again. They make growing up worth the price of admission. 

Happy Birthday, Candice and Sammy! Dad, and Gramps, loves you!

One piece of advice from an Old Man: if anyone tries to lure you into a room full of strange kids, with the promise of meeting a turtle-run! It’s a trap!

God bless y’all!

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  I don’t look it, but I was once a fourteen year old. It’s true. Don’t let the bald head, white beard and thick-lensed bifocals fool you, I really was that young once. I even remember what it felt like to be that adolescent with his whole life ahead of him. I recall the emotions that coursed through me, vibrant and deep feelings that lit up my sponge-like brain and soul. In that time of my life when the world is opening up around you and you start to realize just how big the world is, and how small you are in it, the emotions that rise to the top will color your life for many years to come. My most vivid memories of those years were filled with fear. Yes, fear.

    I grew up in a normal (as if ANYON E is normal!) two-parent home, where my mom stayed at home to raise the kids and my dad went to work to provide for us. Myself, my two older sisters and my brother wanted for nothing. We had everything that children need: love, a roof over our heads and great food on a regular basis. We played sports, and our parents went to games and they played with us at home. We went to church on Sunday, had friends over, and had regular family vacations. There were no great traumas that might bring gloom and doom into our lives as children. Our parents insulated us from most of life’s great hardships at almost every turn. They taught us values and principles that we would need in life. Don’t lie, cheat or steal, love one another, and always help the little guy and those less fortunate than yourself. Never be the aggressor, but stand up to bullies. Our lives were more “normal” than most of our friend’s. So, what did I fear? Good question.

    I was a chubby, ugly, four eyed nerd. Technically, I was “three-eyed” since I’ve had a prosthetic eye since I was seven. I had only a few friends, and no girls liked me. I was okay in some classes at school, like English (reading and writing, but I couldn’t diagram a sentence to save my life!!), but I didn’t stand out. I wasn’t excellent in anything. I played football, but I wasn’t great at it. My brother, Joe, was an awesome, all-district quarterback, while I second-stringed at offensive tackle. I never had a steady girlfriend, and only a handful of dates, during my entire high school “career”. There was never anything “outstanding” about me. I was a loser. I was sure of it. I feared that everyone could see what a loser I was. I feared that I’d never succeed at anything, never be good at anything, and that no one would ever love me. My fear was real.

    I wasn’t a loser. I look back on those years and think of all the times that I hesitated to do something for fear of failure, all the times I hung back in the corner to keep from being seen, and all the times I did something stupid to camouflage how I thought I looked, or felt, and I know now that it was all a part of being that age. We all have those feelings during those early adolescent years. Our bodies and our minds aren’t fully formed. Our opinions, though strong and heart-felt, are seldom fully developed. Most importantly, our perception of who we are is almost never right, because we aren’t yet who we are going to be. For some kids, that fear can last for years. Others may learn early on how to “power through” and find their confidence. I was the former kind of kid. It wasn’t that my parents didn’t try to encourage me, they did. It wasn’t my teacher’s fault, they tried too. Some pre-teens and teens simply fall into a hole that they dig for themselves and don’t know how to extract themselves. Some children can find that confidence in themselves. They take years to realize it. There are so many paths to take as we grow up, that we can easily lose ourselves in the dark forest of life.

    I reflect on those years and remember them differently now. I see the pictures of a healthy, good-looking young man, having fun playing sports, doing good work in school, who had a few really good friends, and had dates with young ladies that didn’t think him too hideous. I even got kissed. The reality of a good childhood doesn’t match the feelings of fear that lived inside of me back then. My perception of my life at fourteen and my memory of actually being fourteen are two very separate things. I wish I could go back in time, if only to point out to my younger self just how wonderful my life was then, and would be in the future. I would encourage myself to be the hero in my own story, and stop sabotaging my own joy. As adults, we forget how real that fear can be. We see kids do things that we don’t understand, and we can’t fathom what must be going through their minds. We forget that those children aren’t any different than we were back then. Sure, the distractions are constantly changing. Technology, media, entertainment, and communication have all taken leaps and bounds ahead of when we were kids, but human beings are still exactly the same.

    We need to turn back to the simplest solutions that work the best. Spend time with them. Listen to them. Play with them. Be available. Be present. Be a good example for them. Encourage them to excel. Teach them how to succeed and how not to fail. Reward them when they put forth their best effort, and have repercussions that are meaningful to them when they screw up. In short, be the parents you know you should be. Even when you are, know this: that young person always has a choice to make. They can keep turning to fear. I did. I looked past how good my life was and chose to slink back into the shadows. Some kids do. Just don’t give up on those kids. My folks never did. My siblings never did, either. I was never the loser I thought I was, and I figured it out. Some of us just take longer to see the beauty in who we are. I just figured it out about myself while I was writing this article. Maybe I haven’t lived in fear for a very long time, but I still had the same perception of my old self tucked away in my mind.

    I pray that, if you have a pre-teen, or teen, that’s going through a dark patch, don’t give up. They have to grow up, and that’s hard for all of us. Be an anchor for them. Let them know that they are seen, and loved, just as they are, and that they’re beautiful. Love them through it.

Man, my hair looked good back then. Sigh.

God bless y’all!

    We live in interesting times. The nation is heading into a presidential race that includes a billionaire, former reality game show host, a female former senator of Jamaican and Indian parents, and a single gay Libertarian man who ran for the Senate in Georgia and got two percent of the vote there. Whew! It’s nice to see how diverse our nation is, even if it seems like we’re the crazy Uncle Curtis of the family of world nations. There’s always France. They do stuff that makes us look normal. Check out the Olympics opening ceremony in Paris, if you don’t believe me. I ain’t lyin.

    In my own personal life, also, I find myself living in interesting times. I’ll turn fifty-nine next month, and the potential for retirement is within my sight, if not my grasp. In the next five years, all of my four kids will be forty and over, I’ll have to decide when to dip into my social security money, and all of my grandkids will be well into school and smarter than me. Not that they aren’t smarter than me now, they’ll just have kindergarten, middle and high school diplomas to prove it. I’ll have to start following Mark Twain’s advice about it being “better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt”. Great tactic for people my age to appear wise. I have my ways.

    Laura Gail and I have moved into her mother’s house, too. God rest your soul, Gmaw. It’s been a big change. More room. More stuff. More cleaning and work. It’s been both a hassle and a blessing. Thankfully, Laura Gail still knows where everything is, or should be. I’m still making piles. I’m working on it, though. Besides losing Gmaw, leaving our old house makes it even sadder for me. I know I was only there for twelve years, but it was home. My wife was there three times longer, but she’s not the sentimental mental case that I am. I attribute too many human characteristics to inanimate objects like books, trees, stuffed animals and houses. Kinda makes it harder to part with things when need to. It’s like you’re burying a friend. Yeah, I know. Sentimental mental case. I’d be a much worse hoarder if it weren’t for my wife. As in most cases, she makes me appear saner than I really am, like the rear-view mirror makes things smaller than they really are.

    The thing about change is that it holds the hope of things being better than you can imagine. When the world turns upside down, a lot of the craziness can get shaken out and go down the drain, like emptying the trash when you’re on the last plastic bag. You want to use it again, but you can never get it be completely like it was before. All the old crazy falls out, but you’re going to put new crazy back in the bag soon. Some of it will be new, some will look just like what you got rid of, but it will all be “interesting” to see. We just have to be sure that, whenever possible, we use a new bag. I like the ones with a slight scent. Get a new bag and start over. There will be stuff to get rid of later, and when I do, “Poppa’s got a brand new bag” as the illustrious poet, James Brown, esquire, once said. 

    Christopher Taylor Stone turns forty-one this Friday. You’d never believe I used to change his diaper and watch “Super Friends” with him. He’s a Physician Assistant in Nashville, with a beautiful lady at his side, a brand new roof over his head, and still rocking black-painted Emo nails and chasing bands across the country when he can. Proud barely touches on my feelings for him. He’s my first born. He let me read him stories when he was small. We played ball together. We had piggy-back rodeos on my back. The man he’s become is compassionate, strong and faithful. He has “heart”. He helped make me an adult. I wouldn’t be who I am today without him. The change he brought to my life was one of the best things that ever happened to me. He made me get a brand new bag. Thank you for that, Christopher. I love you. Enjoy, and  happy birthday! 

God bless y’all!

   

    It’s five thirty in the morning, Sunday, July twenty-first. I’ve been up since two a.m., reading an actual newspaper. I spent hours reading the Wall Street Journal, relishing the articles and opinion pieces while my hands held the flimsy, but comforting, pages in my chubby fingers. My mind has been too active this morning. I needed other voices to tire it out. It worked. Now sleepy, but with the sun rising slowly, casting a pale light on the foggy Tennessee fields around my home, I find myself intellectually stimulated and overwhelmed by information. I love newspapers.

    My love affair with newspapers started during my college year. Some people say, “college years”, but mine was, basically, one year. One does not graduate after one year. One gets married and goes to work after one year. Or at least I did. No regrets, mind you. It’s what I wanted, and I wouldn’t have changed it for anything. While I was there at Arkansas State University I started reading the newspaper on a regular basis. Specifically, the Arkansas Gazette. It was a state-wide paper based in Little Rock, and had a conservative slant, which I found appealing, since I was a Reagan Republican at the time. Still am, I suppose. I miss Ron. It wasn’t the most popular outlook at a liberal arts college, at the time. When I wasn’t in class, or when I skipped class, I’d go to the local used bookstore and cruise for reading material. There was also an arcade on the other side of the street which took a lot of my spare money. If I had any money left after those two favorite haunts, I’d get myself some off-campus lunch. My favorite place to eat was a little further down that street. It was an old barbecue joint, where I’d order up a “Jumbo” pulled pork sandwich and large crinkled fries and a coke. As you go into the place, you’d notice a newspaper box right by the door. I started buying one to read while I ate my lunch alone. I had a small group of friends at college, but, for the most part, I was a solitary guy. So, I started reading the paper.

    When you’re in college, you’re exposed to all kinds of new opinions, cultures and ideas that make quite an impression on your young mind. Two of my best friends were foreign students from Libya and Nigeria. They taught me how to hate soccer properly. They did that by inviting me to play a pickup game with them, whereupon they ran circles around me. Literally. To be fair, they had grown up with the game, and I had just started smoking cigarettes less than a year before, but I was still horrible. They made it worse by letting me know that they were pretty bad players themselves, but my playing made them look like Pele. I took it in stride, but it still colors my lack of admiration for the game. I didn’t hold it against them. They were great guys. You can keep soccer, however. They taught me not to judge people by who runs their country. I hope the rest of the world will give us the same consideration.

     Enjoying the newspaper in a pre-internet world was awesome. I had a portal to the rest of the world, or at least a taste of it. Television was great, but you didn’t get the in-depth investigation into the stories like you can with the written word. Instead of reading between the lines of what commentators said, I enjoyed reading what the writers truly meant as I perused the lines themselves. All the world was at my fingertips, and on a weekly basis, no less. For the cost of fifty cents. Yup. I’m THAT old.

    I know that, nowadays, information is faster, more diverse, and readily available on the internet. Free in many forms, for a price in other venues. Where I see the problem is that many people tend to believe everything they read. No form of press needs be taken for granted to be factual just because it made it to the publishing stage, in print or on the internet. Find many sources of information, electronic and print, and hold them to verifiable standards. Vet the opinions and fact checking. Take nothing granted but but soak it all up like a sponge. Then think on it. Balance the opinions, the stories, the facts and the angles and come up with opinions of your own. You may find yourself coming up with non-mainstream ideas and opinions, versus just following the guy/gal in front of you. That’s a good thing. You may just learn something along the way.

    If newspapers are on the decline, it’s not the internet’s fault entirely. People want their facts to be spoon fed to them with no effort. Click on your app and get the latest blurb about the trending news and read all the short, one-liner quips about events that are complex, yet they’re boiled down to a few sentences by bloggers who give you the “cliff’s notes” version of the news. Stop it. Read. Read a lot of sources, whether online or in book, magazine and other physical forms. Local newspapers, as well as state and national. Digest them all and form your own opinion. It’s a little more work, but it’s worth it. You’ll be smarter for it. It may keep you up at night, I warn you. It may also keep you company when you’re already up at two in the morning. Either way, it’s worth the effort.

It’s six forty-six a.m.

Now I’m sleepy.

God bless y’all.  

 

They shot Trump. The rhetoric and the hate spilled over into action and now we have people dead. One innocent man is dead, and two others are wounded and in the hospital. Trump got hit in the top of his ear. Yup. The ear. That was close for him. It was deadly for Corey Comperatore, 50, a former fire chief. David Dutch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74, are in stable condition. Collateral damage, the military calls it. I call it a tragedy. The young shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks (it’s a rule: you have to call an assassin by all three names), 20, is dead. A pimple-faced young man with the look of a loner. It’s all so cliche. All it’s missing is Mark Mahlberg. Let the conspiracy theorists lose and watch the tornado of imaginations run amok!  

Not me. Although I have a pretty good imagination, I don’t think these people are that smart. Trump’s or Biden’s. Corrupt enough? Yes. Devious enough? Yes. Smart enough? Not so much. I mean, come on-it’s too good. The events are reading exactly as you would have put them in the middle of an action movie. Grazed in the ear? A kid with no military training gets into an open position on a roof for a perfect shot at the candidate? The candidate, grazed and bleeding, raises a fist in defiance and looking for all the world like a tough son of a “gun”? Naw. The networks would’ve turned it down. Been done before. A movie-of-the-week, maybe. If there still was such a thing. Maybe if Melania would agree to mixing in a little love story bit, we could get Hallmark to run it. In the end, though, I just don’t think the guys from either party could’ve pulled this scene off. Definitely out of their skill set.  

Back in 1912, another former president was shot while running to retake the White House. Teddy Roosevelt was running on his new Party ticket, the Bull Moose Party. He was disillusioned by President Taft (his hand-picked successor) and his conservative policies. Taft was, in Teddy’s bespectacled eyes, tearing his legacy of progressivism down, and Teddy was intent on stopping him. Roosevelt was leaving the Gilpatrick Hotel, in Milwaukee, on the way to give a speech. John Schrank (who later claimed insanity) approached him and shot him point blank with a Colt revolver. Teddy should’ve been done for, but his long-windedness saved him. The bullet passed through his metal eyeglasses case, then through his speech, which he had folded up and put in the inside pocket of his jacket. The speech was fifty pages, so it went through one hundred pages before lodging itself in one of Teddy’s ribs. To make the story even more awesome, Teddy refused medical treatment until after he delivered his speech. Ninety minutes later. Another tough son of a “gun”. Hard to believe, but true. Just like last Saturday. 

My heart goes out to the family of Corey Comperatore, as well as to David Dutch and James Copenhaver. I pray for your healing. As for Mr. Trump, I am glad you weren’t killed. We watch the world in flames with war and infighting; hate and prejudice; and we have to hope it won’t happen like that here, on our watch. Let’s tone it down, gentlemen. If we can’t have a peaceful exchange of opinions, peaceful elections, and a smooth and agreeable changing of the guard, then we’re dooming ourselves to anarchy. Not here. Not in America. Please. 

P.S. 

By the way, in case you were wondering, Teddy lost that election. See? Unbelievable, but true. 

God bless y’all! 

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When I married Laura Gail, twelve wonderful years ago, I added another family to my life. It included two adopted daughters and two sons. The youngest of the boys was only about nineteen. They’re all family, but I’ve had many opportunities to get to know this young man over the past twelve years, and I can honestly say it’s been a pleasure to get to know him.  

When we first met, he wore an ever-present black knit cap. He wore mainly black, with slacks and work boots, plus a jacket. Year-round. In Tennessee. He kept his blond hair a little long, and it sprang out of his knit cap from all sides. He had an honest smile, and a quick sense of humor. He was also a little different. Just a tad. 

He was rarely seen without that cap. It was like an extension of him. And I like black as much as anyone, but he wore that color plumb out. The jacket was always on, too. I couldn’t figure that one out. It gets hot around here. Real hot. Jackets still there. Weird, I thought. He was into wearing ankle weights and a weighted vest back then, for strengthening his core, I was told. Add the black clothes, jacket and cap and I fully expected him to pass out at some point. He never did. 

The first time we went to Beech Lake to go swimming, he wore the entire ensemble. To swim in. He took off the cap and jacket. But he left the boots on. I thought the boy might be “a little bit special”. Turns out, I was right. He was special. 

He worked for a local paper as a graphics designer, despite being color blind. He turned a love for video games into a career that cranks out video, computer and print ads and campaigns that are amazing. He went from a shy, reserved kid, to being an accomplished and outspoken adult. He works a problem until he finds an answer, or he pulls the thread until it’s gone. He worked with me at the nursing home for several years, showing me that he can handle manual labor, interact with patients like they are family, and be very efficient at what he does. He makes it a point to own what he does and takes pride in it.  

He married a great gal that also worked at the nursing home, and they had a child. That little guy, Cayde, is one of my most favorite people on the planet. He made my life better. He makes me happy by just showing up. He gets that from his Dad, I think.  

When you marry someone, you marry their family, too. That’s the rules. Like em, or not, they’re family. This kid made his way into my heart from the beginning and I’m proud to know him as my son (put a “step” on it, if you like.). He turned thirty-two last Saturday, and he’s grown into an amazing dad, husband and son. I like him.  

Happy Birthday, Cody! 

God Bless Y’all! 

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    I ain’t nobody. I’m just a simple transplanted Arkansas country boy. I’ve got some college, but never graduated. I quit school to get married and raise a family. Since 1984 I’ve worked hard and struggled to see that my kids were cared for, my bills were mostly paid, and my obligations met to the best of my ability. I pay my taxes. All of them. The ones that come out of my paycheck. The ones they charge on the gas I put in my car. The ones they charge when I pay my light bill. The ones they charge when I buy food. The ones they charge every year for the things I’ve finished paying on, like property. I pay my way. I don’t begrudge anyone for partaking of government assistance. If they need it, we should help. I don’t begrudge anyone trying to legally immigrate to this country to find a better life. More power to them. We need motivated people here. What I do have a problem with is the lack of options when I go to the polls.

    I’m not a lawyer. I couldn’t write a law out on paper, even with the whole internet backing me up. I don’t pretend to have all the answers or even to know all of the questions. I use a mixture of country wisdom and common sense to come up with most of my opinions. I like a good solution to a common problem, and I don’t particularly care if who comes up with the idea is a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, conservative, liberal or a member of the Mickey Mouse Club. I vote for people I believe can find answers to our problems. I want to be represented by people who can bring the problem solvers together, no matter their ideology. I don’t see anyone like that in politics today, either in the state or federal level. The politicians are all at war for power, all the power, and will shut out anyone not in their party. It’s appalling. Shameful. Disgusting.

    Absolute power corrupts absolutely. We keep putting professional politicians in offices where they could care less about the good of the common man, and just serve themselves and their own agenda. They take money from big business, special interest groups, other countries, and from us. They spend millions of dollars and most of their terms simply trying to get re-elected so they can keep suckling on the teat of power. Meanwhile, we get taxed to the gills while we just try and survive. Both major parties have become so intoxicated by their own propaganda, so intent on proving the other party the villain, that they have no idea what we, in mainstream America care about. It sickens me.

    I’m begging all of you “servants of the people” to stop it, for God’s sake! Balance your own checkbooks, buy your own groceries, pay your fair share of taxes, cooperate with each other and care about the things we regular people care about, for a change. Stop thinking that government solves everything. It doesn’t. Never did. The government should be like doctors (or at least how doctors are supposed to be) in the whole “do no harm” sense of things. Build our roads, encourage business to prosper, protect your citizens, and try not to dabble in limiting our personal freedoms. In the process, try and be people that we can trust with the purse strings of this great nation. I wouldn’t trust one single senator, representative, or Presidential Candidate running today with my lunch money, much less the keys to the national treasury. Be honest. Be prepared to compromise and find middle ground. Quit struggling so hard to keep power that you forget why your there in the first place: to represent what the CITIZENS want you to do!

    Most of all, I’m asking you to be adults. Every election looks, and sounds, like a couple of middle school kids arguing over milk money. Arguing over your golf game. Fingers wagging, names being called, wild accusations and charges being filed every time someone gets pissed off. All the while you steal the nation blind and blame the other guy. That’s not how you govern anyone. Especially yourselves.

America says “Help! I need an adult!”

God bless y’all, and God bless the United States of America. Happy Independence Day!

    I’m just a nobody. I have a simple life. I’ve not climbed the corporate ladder, nor made a name for myself in a trade. I’m known by my family and a tiny group of friends. My life is encapsulated within a space that I can honestly say is small. As a writer, I have been read. That’s as close to being a celebrity as I’ll ever get, and, as a writer, is very satisfying. If I’m never known to the world, as a writer, I’m okay with that. I’m blessed right where I am. My life is good.

    This past week, a famous actor passed away. Donald Sutherland. I read of it and was saddened. He played several roles which were dear to me. Most notably, Oddball in “Kelly’s Heroes” His portrayal of Oddball, the unofficial leader of a band of gypsy, hippie, Sherman tank riding soldiers was an amazing, and hilarious, piece of acting. I was a teen when I saw that movie, and have followed Mr. Sutherland’s career since. He’s been a favorite of mine most of my life. His son, the actor Kiefer Sutherland, said in his obituary “Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly. He loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for more than that. A life well lived.” Words well said. It was a noble statement of his father’s life. It made me reflect upon my own life, and examine myself, in relation to those words.

    “Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly.”

    I know that his son was referring to his father’s acting roles, but one could apply that towards the many “roles” we take upon ourselves in life. I’ve been a son, brother, uncle, father, employee, manager and friend. I’ve been a republican, libertarian and independent. I’ve been a heathen, a preacher, and a Christian. When I look upon my life, there are so many sub-divisions of each of those roles that it boggles my mind. At any given time, I’ve played the good, the bad and the ugly versions of each of those roles. When I humble myself for a minute, I recognize that the truth is that I’ve never been perfect at any of those roles. I’m human, and as such, I’m imperfect by nature. And that’s okay. What’s important is to never be daunted by that role. Never back down from being the best you can be in the moment. If we can do that, we’ll be satisfied with what comes from it.

    We’re not always the hero in our story. That’s a cold, hard fact. I’ve been the bad guy many times. I’ve been wrong. I’ve done bad things to people who didn’t deserve it. We all have. To know when you’ve been the bad guy, and to change that narrative, make it right by those you’ve wronged, ask forgiveness and then do better-that’s what counts. Humbling, but true.

    “He loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for more than that. A life well lived.”

    I don’t have to write a best-selling novel to be a writer. I don’t need awards from my day job to be a good employee. I don’t need the little gifts from my kids that say “Best Dad” to be a good dad. In all my roles in life, I can simply love what I do, and do what I love. Even when the role is “Man with a broom” I can do the job with love and love it. It’s easy to love some roles, like being a dad, or gramps, but some roles get maligned just because they’re not in the lead. Don’t fool yourself: those are the roles that need more love than most people give them. I want to be the guy that puts his heart into every role of life and does it with love. It doesn’t matter who sees it, so long as I know I’ve done it with love and my whole heart. That’s a life well lived, indeed.

    Rest in peace, Donald Sutherland. Thank you, Kiefer, for the thought-provoking words.

    As Oddball once said: “Why don’t you knock it off with them negative waves? Why don’t you dig how beautiful it is out here? Why don’t you say something righteous and hopeful for a change?”

Well said, Oddball. Why don’t we all?

God bless y’all!

 

     We used to play “Chase” when we were kids. “Hide and Seek” was also a good game. “Tag” and “Freeze Tag” were also some favorites. Simple, but fun, games that got you outside, interacting with other kids and generally getting us some exercise and fresh air. Yes, we got bruised, skinned (skint is the actual Southern term for it) knees, and other “owies” that Moms are all familiar with, and always made better with a band-aid and a kiss. It was fun. It was outside. I miss those days. I wonder how much of my life has been affected by those little games. We never even realized how the act of playing affected us, until we’re grownups. Some of us never realized it.  

     When you play, you activate your imagination. You make up some things that aren’t there, put arbitrary rules in place, and then try to win. Fairly accurate? I think so. You can do it all by yourself or invite others to play with you. That brings a whole new perspective on the game, as the other person, or people, bring different ideas and strategies with them. Some of them even cheat. Not us, of course, but those OTHER people. Sometimes we have to “referee” our own games, and not everyone defines the rules in the same way. There are arguments, fights even, and sometimes the game gets cancelled because of the dispute. There are great victories, horrible losses, and the occasional tie that nobody likes. Yup, play teaches us a lot. How we learn to play, win and lose, will imprint upon our character, our emotions, our outlook and our attitude long after we stop playing the simple games. We take all of that into adulthood. For better or worse.  

     I didn’t win a lot of those games when I was younger. I was slow, poorly coordinated, and chubby. I wasn’t agile, fast or skilled at many of them, but I still had fun. We played for fun and had plenty of it. Still, feelings got hurt and egos bruised more times than I can count. I didn’t always get my way, even though I was “the baby”. My brother and sisters played to win, and so did I. That was part of the fun. Bragging rights were important, as were winning and losing. That’s okay. You win some, you lose some. 

     I don’t see kids playing like that nearly as much as I remember us doing. Technology and science have brought us into an “Entertainment Renaissance” that has totally transformed a young person’s play atmosphere. They can play video games online with other people anywhere on the planet. They can investigate facts and look at things online that make Encyclopedia Britanica look like a newsletter. They have access to so much stuff. I just wonder what exactly it’s teaching them about the real world around them. People are losing their ability to communicate with one another, express themselves to other people and to find artistic outlets that are truly genuine, I believe. Too much is done for them by technology. We lose out when we don’t learn the simple truths of playing. Skint knees and all, it’s worth it. There are times when skint knees are necessary. Without those original small sacrifices (in pain, sweat and losses) how do we learn about ourselves and others? When we can just start the game over on the computer, and play for thirty-six hours until we master the game, how do we really know if we’re good at it, or just wearing it down through repetition? I really think we need those skint knees. It gets us ready for those years when Mom’s not there to kiss it and make it all better. I still miss that part, myself.  

Y’all play nice out there! 

God bless y’all! 

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    Friday night football game. Turrell Rockets versus Cross County Thunderbirds. We’re two touchdowns ahead, so Coach put in us third stringers to get some experience. The ball is hiked, and nobody blocks me. I take two steps into the backfield. I can see the quarterback as plain as day. I take a half step towards him, thinking I’m about to get my first sack. No. They’re running to my side, pulling their right guard to block me as they sweep in my direction. I’m slow. So very slow. In a blink, the quick, and large, lineman slams into my left thigh and puts me on my back. I heard an incredibly loud “craaack!” and wondered “what the heck was that?” In the next second, I knew: he’d broken my left leg at the knee. I’d gotten my big break in football.

    I wasn’t unconscious, but everything went dark. It was because I was staring up at the night sky. The stadium lights glowed in my peripheral view, but I didn’t really notice them. I was in shock, just a bit. My head rolled back and forth on the grass and all I could say was “Aw shoot” over and over. Shoot has definitely been substituted for the actual word. My Momma reads these things. Next thing I know, our Line Coach, Coach Britton is hovering over me.

    “Stone. Get up, Stone. Shake it off, man. Hey, c’mon Stone. No?”

    “It hurts. My left knee. #@!% it hurts, Coach.”

    Coach Britton calls to the sidelines for our managers to bring the stretcher out. They’ll carry me off the field. I have truly fallen on the field of battle. In the moment, there is no glory. Only pain.

    Speaking of pain, our managers, Ricky (maybe five feet tall) and Malcolm (at least six feet tall) put me on the stretcher and carry me from the field. Their height difference causes me to slant at an angle, and in their rush to get my bulky self off the field, they’re making my broken knee bounce with every step. “Ow! Ow! Ow!” is all that I can say, while the announcer (our school counselor, Mr. Smith) calls out my name and asks the crowd to applaud my brave departure. Yeah, right.

    By the time Ricky and Malcolm got me to the gym, they were exhausted. I was never a skinny kid. My dad was waiting with his truck. He’d been watching in the stands, and when the ambulance hadn’t showed up fast enough for him, he went and got his truck. His boy needed a doctor, and he needed it now. My dad was a man of action. He’d enlisted his friend, who was a jailer for the county and a deputy sheriff and had a blue light on the roof of his car, to run escort for him. Yes, I had a police escort to the hospital. My dad also used to race “C”Cars on dirt racetracks, back in the day, so this was going to be interesting. All my dad said to me was “does it hurt, son?” Before I could get out “not too bad”, we were off like a shot.

    The drive from Turrell to West Memphis, Arkansas is eighteen miles. That’s just a twenty-minute drive. I’m pretty sure we made it in about eight minutes. I’d never gone so fast in my life. The flashing blue light ahead of us warned traffic away, and they even had intersections blocked off for us to blow through. I told my dad “It’s not that bad, dad.” But he just said “We’ll be there in a minute. It’s okay.” He wasn’t kidding. I didn’t know what fast was until that night. The ride raised my adrenaline level higher than the pain even thought about doing.

    It turned out that I’d broken (or had broken for me) the “growth plate” in my left knee. Luckily, I had already reached five feet, ten inches in my sophomore year, so it didn’t affect the length of my leg. I did get to wear a beautiful white, itchy, thigh to toe, plaster cast for about six months. I only stayed in the hospital for one night, and it was raining when I got home. I discovered immediately that rain and bones have a weird relationship. My knee hurt like crazy.

    Mom had stayed home the night of the game. I found out later that, upon being told I’d been hurt at the game and was headed to the hospital, she’d said “what was he doing playing?” Yup. Same thing I said.

    Being a dad myself, I understand a lot more about why my dad took it upon himself to race to the hospital with me. We see our children get hurt and we have to do something. So, he did. There are many other times in their lives that we have no options. We can’t do anything but watch them suffer through whatever pain they’re going through. It gets even worse as they get older. You can only offer so much advice, set so many examples, preach through so many speeches. Then it’s up to them. It’s hard to sit on the sidelines and pray. Sometimes there are rare occasions when you get to rush your boy to the hospital with the speedometer pegged to the right, with blue lights flashing, at lightning speeds. Just because your baby boy is hurt, and you have a chance to help fix him. Thank God for those times. And thank God for my dad, Wayne Stone, for being the kind of man who couldn’t just sit on the sidelines. I understand now. I miss, and love you, Dad. 

God bless y’all.