July 24, 2020

Melissa and I are back on track starting last night with the reopening of Major League Baseball.  Two games were featured on the opening double header on ESPN2.  The first game was a six-inning rain delay between the Yankees and the Nationals in Washington.  The second game featured the Dodgers and the Giants in Los Angeles.  While the East Coast game featured the starting pitchers in two of last year’s World Series games (1 and 5), the West Coast featured a standing rivalry of two of the best teams in the division for the last 60 years.  The only problem was there are two teams I really do not like to watch, and one played in each game.

Even with the start of Baseball, a lot of discussion revolves around how to judge winners and losers of a 60-game season.  Definitely an asterisk, but what else?  To add to the confusion, there are substantial rule changes to allow the distancing required for play to begin.  Aside from the Health and Safety changes and scheduling differences, five major changes are effective tonight.  The National League is using the designated hitter for the first time and all extra innings start with a player on second base in both leagues.  There is now a three-batter minimum for relief pitchers and anyone on the roster can come in to pitch, but all eligible players need to be on the roster.  Finally, there are strict prohibitions against unsportsmanlike conduct.  No empty benches in the covid-19 era.

The lack of fans is being handled by different clubs in different ways, as evidenced tonight.  The Nationals are playing in a stadium with empty seats.  The Dodgers took a different approach, allowing fans to purchase a cardboard virtual presence for $149 or $299 a seat depending on location.  The purchase is tax deductible, with the proceeds going to fund some of the “most pressing problems facing Los Angeles with a mission to improve education, health care, homelessness, and social justice for all Angelenos.”  The website has suggestions for how to take the best Dodger paraphernalia photo of yourself, and you can decide to take your dog to the park in the seat next to you.

THOUGHTS:  I feel like this entire year is going to get an asterisk for all of us.  This is the year with no Prom and limited or delayed graduation ceremonies.  This is the year where we do not know how to run an election campaign or even make voting available for people.  This is the year where we already have 4.11 million confirmed cases in the U.S. and nearly 145,000 deaths.  This is the year where after a month of lock-down the streets exploded in protests and violence.  And this is the year where discussions about racism being held dormant are resurfacing in hopeful ways. Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 23, 2020

It had “cooled down” to the mid-90s today so I decided to try my hand at fishing.  I had fished Natural Dam once before, but the water was low and other than a couple of bluegills, I had no luck.  When I arrived today, I found the previously empty lot half filled with vehicles.  I could not believe there were that many people fishing, and I was right.  It turned out everyone was there for swimming.  There were about fifteen people scattered above the dam, so I walked down stream.  The water was low again, and every hole for a half a mile had a family playing in the water.  Even the “holes” were only about two feet deep.  I did get some strikes and finally hooked a small bass.  At least it was a nice walk.

When I worked as an Historian part of what I did was catalog Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) sites for our data base.  That meant I spent time reading about the different locations, checking to see what was left, and documenting how well they were preserved.  Since these sites were on my radar, I was surprised to find a cement slab with a hole in the middle on the family farm.  It seems granddad had been targeted to receive one of the new outhouses the CCC was digging in rural Kansas.  When I asked, my father recalled how mad granddad got when they built it.  He had asked them to use the old wood pile (he never threw anything away, just in case), but they had used his new wood instead.  They were trying to make it look better, and he knew it was just an outhouse.

Since it was still early afternoon, I took a left on the way home to see if I could find more river.  The sign said Lee River (a town as well as the river’s name) was only 8 miles.  The road wound up and down the steep hills of the Ozark National Forest.  I never did see Lee River, but I ended up at Devil’s Den State Park.  The site stands as one of the most intact CCC sites in the U.S.   An impressive rock dam spans Lee Creek forming the 8-acre Lake Devil.  The park’s hiking, backpacking, mountain bike, and horseback riding trails lead to the surrounding Ozark National Forest.  You are not allowed to swim in the Lake, but there were about 30 people at the swimming pool.  I am glad I got to see the site, even if it was by accident.

THOUGHTS:  I could not help but see the irony as I drove the road leading to Devil’s Den.  The main task of the CCC was to put America back to work following the Crash and unemployment of the Depression.  While recovery did not happen until the industrial ramp up of World War II, a large portion of CCC work dealt with creating infrastructure.  There had to be at least six sections of road where the shoulder and a portion of the lane had collapsed down the hill and several more where earlier washouts had temporary patches.  Before the pandemic congress tried to pass a bill to fund infrastructure improvements.  I guess clean water, bridges and road repair are not as important as politics.  Change is coming and it starts with you

July 22, 2020

I grew three different types of hot peppers in my garden.  The first was a normal Jalapeno pepper which gets about three or four inches long when it is ready to pick.  The second was a Mammoth Jalapeno which grows to around six inches.   The last type was a Habanero Pepper which only gets about an inch and a half.  My two jalapenos have stopped production now that it has gotten hot, but the Habanero has only come on in the last few weeks.  The plant is covered with small peppers ready to pick.  I have found the peppers grown in my containers are not as big as normal ones.  Despite their smaller size, they make up for it with heat.

I mentioned earlier I spent a month on a farm in Egypt as part of an excavation.  We were cutting cost and ate whatever the farmer’s wife made for us, essentially a meatless diet.  One of my favorite foods was a pickled chili pepper which in Arabic was called “afilfil.”  At first, the peppers seemed like fire, but by the end of the month I was chomping them down.  I went on a survey party when I returned and one of the leaders had come back from New Mexico with some of the hottest peppers he had ever eaten. He passed them around and everyone started choking from the heat, except me.  I think it made him mad, but I told him these were nothing compared to the “afilfil” I had been eating for the last month.

I picked several of the small habaneros a couple of days ago but have been reluctant to try one.  We use jalapeno peppers in most of the things we fix, but I was unsure how to fix the habaneros.  I needed to know how hot it was before I mixed it in any food.  I was joking around last night and told Melissa I would give her a dollar if she ate one.  Without hesitation she said she would if I did and the dare was on.  I picked out two small peppers, we counted it down, and then we both ate a pepper.  For the next five minutes my mouth was on fire.  I ate a piece of bread.  I drank ice water.  Melissa put mashed potatoes on a spoon to cover her tongue.  Nothing helped until the heat finally dissipated.

THOUGHTS: “Bringing the heat” is a colloquialism for facing a challenge or hard times.  When Melissa and I ate our peppers last night we literally “brought the heat.” After eating her pepper Melissa warned me not to rub my face, as she rubbed her nose and it was burning from the residue of the pepper left on her hands.  During our current situation, it seems the heat has been brought to us.  The issue we need to face is how we will respond.  We need to ask probing questions about how we have addressed (or not) racism.  We need to keep (or start) the uncomfortable conversations with those around us.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 20, 2020

One of the great things about working on my Grandfather’s farm was being able to drive around the back country in an old pickup.  I noticed the old timers in the area would wave to me as I drove past.  I realized what they were doing and began to return their waves.  As the summer progressed, I saw a difference in the waves.  When I first arrived, they recognized I was in my Grandfather’s truck, so they acknowledged me by raising one finger on the right hand off the wheel.  As the summer progressed, they realized I was the grandson, so I got two fingers off the wheel.  Later when I drove with my grandfather at the wheel, we would get the two fingers raised slightly above the wheel.  There was a hierarchy of acceptance.

We purchased our Wrangler and quickly moved to Arkansas.  As we drove around our new town, I noticed other Wrangler drivers would wave as we went by.  This was generally a wave of two fingers of the left hand off the wheel.  At first, I thought they were mistaking me for someone else, as I noticed the large number of Wranglers that drove through or around our town.  Then I saw a Jeep commercial and the Wrangler driver raised the two fingers as they passed another Wrangler.  That is when I learned about the Wrangler Wave.

There are some “how, when, and why” elements to the Wrangler Wave, and if you own one, you better know what they are.  Otherwise, you may be subject to the wrath of Jeep Nation.  There is also a hierarchy for waving, just like on the farm.  This determines who waves first.  It goes like this.  The older the Jeep, the dirtier, if you have the top or doors off, what type of accessories you sport, and lastly the model, and ultimately, all other Jeeps defer to the Wrangler.  If you are lower on the scale, it is your responsibility to initiate the wave.  Frankly, I have never seen any other Jeep driver other than in a Wrangler wave.  I guess they do not understand the culture.

THOUGHTS:  The wave is said to have begun after World War II as the GI’s came home.  If you owned a Jeep, you were probably a fellow veteran.  This created an affinity for each other that has been passed down.  Now the affinity is a shared joy in off roading.   Creating an affinity for other like-minded people can produce rapid acceptance to the group.  It can also be used to exclude others.  We have used “race” to separate into us and them, despite the less than 1% difference in all human DNA.  Perhaps our affinity should be the Human race.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 20, 2020

Melissa sent me a post from NPR several days ago that I just got around to reading over the weekend.  This was a conversation with Layla Saad, an East African, Arab, British, Black, Muslim woman living in Qatar.  She has come up with a 28-day process designed to teach those with white privilege how systemic racism works.  More importantly, how to stop contributing to white supremacy in the world.  This began as a PDF digital workbook but has now become a New York Times bestseller called, Me and White Supremacy.

The burning question asked in her interview was, “What do you think is the biggest obstacle or the toughest challenge for white people when they decide they want to take this challenge?”  Her response, “People get stumped on white exceptionalism.”  Saad went on to explain white exceptionalism as the idea that as a white person, I am one of the good ones.  She went on to explain there is no good or bad.  What we are talking about is being unaware of the ways you are causing harm to other people.  That is the purpose of her book.

I was intrigued by the article, looked the book up on Amazon, and read the introductory pages provided.  This made me more curious.  One of the suggestions was to complete this book as part of a group where you could (honestly) discuss your responses to the daily questions.  Melissa had already mentioned she would like to be able to find a resource like this, and we decided to go through the book together.  I saw the book was offered in a Kindle format for half the cost (I am my father’s son), and we downloaded the book and began the journey last weekend.  We are two days in.

THOUGHTS:  Like Acho’s Uncomfortable Conversations, Saad’s White Supremacy is intended to get the conversation started.  When we answered the first day’s questions it reinforced the limited interaction with BICOP (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) we both had growing up.  Arkansas was part of the segregated South and Kansas lacked the cities and large-scale manufacturing that fostered migration.  Saad promised in her introduction that the book would make me mad.  It is a learning experience.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 18, 2020

The Republican Governor of our state issued an edict yesterday saying effective Monday, masks will be required for anyone over the age of 10 who is out in public (unless prohibited for health).  Several cities already had laws requiring the use of masks.  More businesses had also gone from suggesting to requiring masks to enter, and not just the local stores but large chains like Target and Walmart.  Despite the existing level of acceptance, the Executive Order was met with public outcry.  State representatives spoke out because they were not contacted.  Law enforcement complained about enforcing the misdemeanor offence, with many saying they would refuse. Individuals spoke to the constitutionality of making this mandate against their civil rights.

The edict was made in response to the rising number of cases across the state as we began to open.  The guidelines for opening included directives like, six-foot social distancing, not gathering in large groups, and wearing a mask when not at home.  These are the guidelines issued by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and are like every state.  The problem is the lack of compliance.  The essential meat processing industry was hit first, and Memorial Day and Fourth of July celebrations blew the two months of lock down completely out of the water.

A national CDC internet survey in April found about 62% said they would follow the recommendations and a repeat in May showed an increased to more than 76%. The CDC said on a post today if everyone would just wear a mask, and nothing else, we could have the outbreak under control within six to eight weeks.  Neither polling figure is close to “everyone.”  I did find the timing of the mandate interesting.  I guess the Governor thought we could all use one last night in the bars mingling with other unmasked people to get it out of our system.  Oh wait, that is why we are doing this in the first place.

THOUGHTS:  To wear a mask or not is not an issue of personal freedom amid a national crisis.  Governors who are refusing to put a mask order in place cite the rights of individuals and say they will make the right decision.  The obvious problem with that logic is they do not.  That is evidenced by the large parties of unmasked people celebrating in closed conditions.  We hear daily that wearing a mask is not about you, it is about me.  There is an adage from the 19th century that says, “My right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins.”  In this case perhaps the nose should be covered.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 17, 2020

I realize this is coming late but there have been other issues needing to be addressed.  Fourth of July weekend brought back memories of past celebrations.  Our family spent one Fourth at our parents in western Kansas when we were all twenty-somethings.  The small town we were in did have a fireworks display, but they also sold fireworks.  My favorite has always been bottle rockets. We purchased several gross and began to shoot them off using differing combinations for the best effect.  Apparently one of the hot casings fell in the ditch next to a ripe wheat field across the street and caught it on fire.  We all ran across the street to stomp out the flames, along with two boys who had stopped to watch the fun.  As we were extinguishing the last of the fire, the local marshal pulled up and yelled at the boys that they were in trouble because he knew who they were.  I hope it got sorted out because we all left.

When I lived along the Wasatch Front in Utah, they did not allow personal use of explosive fireworks.  They get very little rain (around 300 millilitres per year) which causes dry conditions.  Most of the water that feeds the valley comes from snow melt runoff from the surrounding mountains.  When a friend moved into the state, he went to the fireworks stand his first year to get fireworks to celebrate the Fourth of July as he usually did.  He told me how disappointed he was that the only things available were sparklers and glow worms.  Utah is also known for its mining industry, so he went to a mining supply store and legally bought blasting caps.  He took these out to the desert and proceeded to blow stuff up.

Arkansas has taken the opposite approach toward celebrations on the Fourth.  Every year there are large demonstrations put on by every big or small town.  These are augmented by the tradition of personal displays, some of which rival the town display.  Amid the social distancing of the pandemic most of these town displays were canceled.  They did broadcast a fireworks display on TV, but that is not the same as smelling the smoke. The dozens of stands in our town were still well stocked and sales were brisk.  When we got out on the fifth, I was surprised to see empty shelves in every stand.  There was also a spent bottle rocket laying on our backyard deck.  I am glad it did not fall on the roof and start a fire.

THOUGHTS:  Although humans are a highly adaptable animal, we do not seem to like change. The noise and smell of smoke that mark our Fourth celebrations throw our pets into fits of fear and trembling.  Still, we just lock them in the back room and hope for the best.  Many are handling the growing pandemic in the same way.  We know how to curb the spread as most nations around the world have done so.   The problem is it requires us to be conscious of others by wearing a mask and practicing social distancing.  This is apparently too great of an inconvenience for some.  They prefer to “lock it in the back room and hope for the best.”  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 16, 2020

Sunday’s paper had an OP-ED by Kareem Abbul-Jabar (yes, the basketball player).  The question he raised is one that is on the mind of many of us as we think about moving forward.  How can we sustain the momentum we are experiencing for the anti-racism movement?  He began by recalling the many times in his own 60 years of activism that he has heard the cries for help and the Gospel songs of soothing, only to have the sympathetic audience once moved to tears simply go away once the chorus is over.

He went on to cite some of the events that make him hopeful.  There are the city and state governments who are instituting police reforms.  Private corporations are making more inclusive policies and media companies are firing executives, actors, and writers for misogynistic behavior.  Celebrities and politicians are making public statements supporting Black Lives Matter.  Sports organizations are offering public apologies for past acts of exclusion.  Even more, he felt optimism when he saw police officers linked arm in arm with protestors.  This is something he believed his own decorated police officer father would have done.

While this is great, the fight for equal rights is a life-long commitment.  What Jabar finds disappointing is the white moderate.  Open racism can be addressed, but moderates concerned more with “order” than “justice” is harder to confront.  “There have been suggestions for reform in our systems of justice, policing, healthcare, education and economic security, all of which give preference to white people.”  What is needed is a way to measure performance and manage progress.  Jabar closes saying, “The moral universe doesn’t bend toward justice unless pressure is applied.”

THOUGHTS:  I find two burning issues in Jabar’s editorial.  The first is how to constructively move beyond our focus on order and confront the systemic injustice that pervades our society.  We have taken steps in the right direction, but we need to continue the walk.  The second comes directly from the first, how to continue to focus on justice and not let the voices die down.  It is hard to commit to a lifetime of change, especially when it does not confront us every time we step out the door.  Sadly, that is the daily reality for many.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 15, 2020

I came across a podcast by cardiologist Dariush Mozaffarian addressing population growth and the stress it places on our planet and us.  It is estimated that population on earth reached one billion in 1804.  It took another 123 years to rise to two billion in 1927, but only 33 years to reach three billion in 1960.  This rapid increase caused many to fear starvation would become widespread, not to mention other malnutrition diseases like scurvy, rickets, and plague. The world focused on the intentional goal of stocking cheap, high calorie, shelf stable food, fortified with vitamins to combat this threat.  The good news is it worked and as of March the total population stands at 7.8 billion.  The bad news is it caused other problems just as serious.

Mozaffarian says the problem we are currently having is the conjunction between two different pandemics.  The corona virus is a fast pandemic.  This burst on the planet last November (as far as we know) and rapidly spread world-wide in a few short months.  Those that seem hardest hit are people who already suffered from a slow pandemic that has been with us for the last 40-50 years, obesity.  Only 12% of people in America are metabolically healthy, defined as weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, glucose level, and hypertension.  This slow pandemic and its effect when combined with covid-19 have never been mentioned in any of the nightly updates.

I have tried several diets over the years and have found they all work to some degree.  The problem comes when you decide to stop following the diet.  This often comes with regaining whatever weight you lost along with additional pounds.  This yo-yo effect is well documented by nutrition scientists.  What is needed is not a diet but a shift in lifestyle.  I have lost weight recently by concentrating on caloric intake, but more importantly by recognizing the foods I eat. This means staying away from the “cheap, high calorie, shelf stable food fortified with vitamins” in favor of fresh lean meats and vegetables.  That is why I grow my garden.

THOUGHTS:  I have (only tongue-in-cheek) thought about pushing what I have found to be a highly effective weight loss tool that I call the Dehydration Diet (or maybe D²?).  All you need to do is weed your garden in the 100-degree temperatures and you are sure to lose 4-5 pounds.  I do not think this is a sustainable long-term solution, however.  I read that upwards to 30% of Federal and State budgets are spent on healthcare, and businesses spend another two trillion on health care annually.  We need to stop dieting and instead make a lifestyle shift that can be followed the rest of your life.  Hopefully, this is one of the lessons we keep moving forward.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

July 14, 2020

I find it amazing that we have over 300 channels on our TV and I still cannot find anything to watch.  I guess this once more lets me know how much I used to watch sports.  That was true again on Saturday night as I slinked back into my office to play my game.  Melissa had said there was not anything on and she was going to work on her succulents.  It turned out she instead turned on a movie that she really enjoyed called Last Christmas, released in 2019.

I looked this up to see why she was so entranced by the movie.  The story is about a young aspiring singer who works as an “elf” in a year-round Christmas store.  Things are falling apart around her, but with every mishap she runs into Tom.  Kate begins to spend more time with Tom and works on improving her life to be more like him.  They break up but Kate goes to his apartment to make amends.  While there she finds out Tom had died in a bicycle accident last Christmas.  She then finds Tom was the organ donor whose heart she received, and that all their interactions were hallucinations. Going to a small garden Kate meets Tom again.  The bench where they sat during their first visit is a memorial bench for Tom.  The movie fades into a summer scene and a happier Kate writing in her journal.  Kate looks up, as Tom always advised.

With theaters closed during most of the pandemic few new movie releases have come out during the last months.  Those that have are limited releases on private platforms like Disney or Netflix.  Another response by stations has been to rerun blockbuster films from years past.  I have noticed several marathon showings.  These are back-to-back showing of all nine Star Wars, or complete runs of all ten Band of Brothers episodes.  One channel has even brought back the Sunday Night at the Movies motif.  Some are as hungry for movies as I am for sports.

THOUGHTS:  One of the appeals for old blockbusters is they take us back to a time and place.  Raiders of the Lost Ark was partially filmed at Petra, an archaeological site I had returned from not a month before I saw the movie.  I saw Jurassic Park at Green Lake during my introduction to denominational polity.  During the pandemic, many people are using movies to go back to an earlier time.  The problem is, the good ol’ days were never that good, at least for some.  Rather than a return to the past, we need to work to make a better future.  Change is coming, and it starts with you.