Summa Cum Laude

whatever will be, will be."

I ran into this little girl (estimated age 4) hanging on to her mother's thigh at a farmer's market.  It was about three years ago. I'm not sure I've captured the measure of her expression's impact on me. I can only tell you that expression ignited a rocket of emotions from my pate to my "pinky."

This toddler's expression is related to a man holding a dog on a leash right in front of her. Mother's leg seemed to be her only defense.  It was a kind well trained dog, but she had no way of knowing that. She was not about to let go of that thigh.

Well when I was her age, 4? It is my earliest in life total recall. I was in a yard three doors to the south of ours. There lived a teenager with a real sadistic mean streak in him.  I won't use his name in case he has a really good lawyer. Let's just call him HP.

Well HP invited me into his backyard and asked me if I wanted him to lift me up so I could see what was on the other side of the fence?

"Okay!"

Well, HP lifted me up, and set me down on that other side of the fence and walked away laughing. I on the other hand was full of fear and bawling. I was on the next block and I might as well have been in another galaxy.  I was totally lost.

It probably took a half hour for me to hook back up with my parents. I don't know if HP got in any trouble for that, but here is an example that there CAN BE justice in life.

A few years later HP tried to get frisky with my older sister. He clearly picked the wrong victim. She quite methodically shoved a broom handle down his throat separating him from two of his front teeth. ( My dad, who grew up on the streets of Chicago during the great depression, was pretty insistent that all us offspring know how to handle ourselves.)

The story is, urban myth though it may be, says HP ended up in prison. That would be justice plus. But back to that toddler's expression.

I've been seeing it over and over again on campus this past month. It is acute graduation panic fever. It is staring at the unknown.  

Every once in a while I catch myself being cruelly philosophical.

"Oh, don't worry about it. You'll find something.  It'll all work out."

But that little girl's expression has become my conscience. I was shaking in my boots at graduation. I had no idea who was going to hire me, what exactly I'd be doing, where I would be living, and I had this giant dog staring me down and growling at me.

Well it has all worked out and I regret nothing. But in truth that degree is not mother's thigh. Even for Summa Cum Laude the essays, the multiple choice and the true and false have just begun.

I think what I've learned in retrospect is that you cannot replace mother's thigh. But you can ease the fear and pain by (cliche alert) "sticking together." Stay in touch with each other. And don't just share your successes. Share your pain, your fears, your suffering as well.  (cliche 2) Misery not only loves company, it needs it.

Every single one of you will experience some degree of loneliness, fear, real and emotional pains you won't even be able to express or define.  And in a world that is changing so dramatically right now, don't expect to find instant security. And don't hide behind false bravado. 

It is true that for most of you things are going to eventually work out. Not all of your decisions will be perfect ones. And the dreams you chase will evolve. And you won't be PERFECTLY happy.

"the future is not ours to see, que sera, sera!" 

But if you stick together, share your moments in time, support each other, be your own institutions, everything IS going to be okay.

Oh, and this is really important.  Enjoy it. Enjoy it. Enjoy it. Do that? And mother's thigh can take a break. And you can put regret back in jail with HP.

CONGRATULATIONS.

Mother's Day

"She walks in beauty, like the night!"

Lord Byron

It is still the toughest profession on earth, motherhood. It is clearly the longest career path. It starts with "mu,mu," progresses to "mama," to "mother," to "mom," to "grandmother," to "grandma," (pronounced GRAH mah) to "nana," with a whole bunch of pet names along the way.

The Mother I'm closest to is my wife.

 

And yeah, I call her Peggy, but I'll admit it today. I need a little "mothering" once in a while, and even though sometimes I think she resorts to some pretty "tough love," it is all for my "OWN GOOD!"

This is an exciting time for Peggy. The is the first time she spends Mother's Day as a GRANDMOTHER. She is out in Calfornia babysitting little Maren Noel.

But it is just like her. In the midst of feeding the baby, then singing her to sleep, and yelling at the dogs, she is worrried about her daughter Rhonda having to be away from her child on her first Mother's Day.

 

And, hey, I think she is worried about me and what I'm doing. Now that may be "did he remember to take out the trash,"  "did he straighten his collar," " did he wipe the toothpaste off his lips," "did he shut off even ONE LIGHT in the house," did he wash any clothes?" Well you get the gist of the moment.

I can be an independent cranky old guy. I can work up a very crusty attitude. I curse at stupid drivers, I make caustic remarks in the grocery store. I get dirty and don't clean up for days. Every once in a while I spit.  And I love this new study that says you'll live longer if you regularly expel gas. But do you know what?

When she is not here?

 

I MISS MY MOMMY!

COME ALIVE!

I tell my broadcast journalism and announcing students that it is not true you must be a type "A" personality to have a radio and or TV career. You need not bounce off the wall 24 hours a day. And that is true, too, of all types of performing.  It is just that when the Curtain goes up? When the Camera Light comes on? When the Microphone Switch is thrown.  THEN YOU COME ALIVE!

I think most people can intellectualize the concept.  And I think most of us have heard how that BIG star "SO AND SO" is really nice and shy in person.  But sometimes you need something or someone special to illustrate it.  Man did I get it in my email today.

That is Stephenie Davis up there. I used to call her student.  Now I call her friend. She was a division 2 all conference basketball star.  She was an all around track athlete and  javelin champion in high school. She graduated with honors. But believe me it never shows in person. She is so calm, so warm, so polite, so unassuming.

Peggy and I used to love to go to the restaurant where Stephenie served breakfast.  She would walk up to us, form this huge ear to ear grin, and say, "THE USUAL? " Who does that anymore?

But there is a larger story to this posting. I get lost in time frames these days.  But I think it was about two years ago that a coaching job didn't really work out for Stephenie. And she was back waiting tables. She was getting tired and feeling sick to her stomach. She was losing a lot of weight. She thought it was the long hours and hard work.

It turns out she became critically ill with what turned out to be Chrons disease. Surgery followed. They took away most of her stomach. There would be a long rehabilitation period.

Well SHE IS  BACK...and when the CAMERA SHUTTER SNAPS? Stephenie Davis COMES ALIVE!  Moved by some of the people who kept her alive, Stephenie is heading to nursing school in Portland next semester.  And it looks to me like, and hey I'm way predjudiced on this one, she is going to have plenty of cab fare money from MODELING on the side.

She is one of those athletes you CAN dress up.  Hey Steph, does that nursing school have a basketball team? Just wondering.

 

Snow Job 2

I think I already used SNOW JOB as a previous slug...so I'm making this SNOW JOB 2. 

 

In case the phrase "snow job" is so passe to be useless in current inter-generational conversation?  It means trying to "pull the wool over someone's eyes."  Whoops there's another one (cliche). So let's see? A "con job" maybe? A scam? Well I guess I'm just going to have to "spell it out" for you.

It snowed today.  Not much.  Certainly not as much as the picture up there I pulled out of my archives. At least, if you've gotten this far, you know I'm "fessin' up."  So, hopefully the dramatic photo "got your attention," and now I can get on with "the straight poop."

You see it was 75 degrees out yesterday.  I took my Broadcast Journalism , Television class out for walk just to "see what we could see." 

Quite often, I tell them, "if you keep your 'eyes peeled,' and 'all the wax out of your ears?' You will see and hear things that will allow you to tell stories without ever having to stroke the truth. (very much)  

So here are a few observations we now collective harbor.  On our walk, just as we are leaving campus, I think, to the person, we all become aware of a particular circumstance.  

First we hear the backfiring crackle of exhaust not allowed to be produced by automobiles.  For some reason? Motorcycles seem to get over looked in noise ordinance enforcement.  That is the case here for sure. (There were some deaf cops sitting right across the street.)   But that really isn't the story.  It just gets our attention.

I don't know how many CC's this guy is sittin' on.  But this is no MOTOR SCOOTER.  There is no doubt in any of our minds that this guy will be keepin' up with traffic on the highway. And there is no doubt in any of our minds that he is going to get some attention, and not for the decibels involved in his piston pushing.

HERE is what WE ALL notice. And MAN to have a microphone and a camera. Broadcast journalists, always be ready. This one got away.

I'm sure most of you live in states where there have been LOUD debates over helmet laws.  I bring this up because regardless of your posture on the issue, YOU WANT THIS VIDEO TO MAKE YOUR CASE NO MATTER WHERE YOU STAND.

This guy is CLEARLY wearing a helmet. This HELMET must have been designed by NASA, or at least to make NASA jealous. It is three times bigger than his head, looking like it has satellite communication installed behind this massive heat shield. And I'm sure he is being led into road ecstasy by some Billy Joel album he is receiving via double-Dolby.  It, the helmet, has to have at least cost more than his bike, maybe his house.  I think you've got the picture.  AH, BUT NOT THE WHOLE PICTURE.

Below the helmet? Nice Studded Black Leather Jacket, you're thinkin'?  Nope.  This guy is wearing a TANK TOP. Scan south in the fashion of the day we find our man of the day sitting inside ragged cutoffs. (Can I say cutoffs? You know old comfortable levis you've cut the legs off of,  and then hidden from your wife, mother, sister, daughter because you know one of them wants to throw them out?) But you are still not getting the whole picture. We complete his ensemble by noting that his feet are fully protected from the heat of the engine,  and the hardness of the asphalt, by his FLIP FLOPS.

( I am handily advised by a budding journalist not to call them "THONGS."  I guess "THONGS" refer to something else now.)

Anyway, so we are now fully into talking about issues of transportation, and I ask, " are any of you making any personal travel choices now because of the price of a gallon of gas?"

I'm expecting to hear the standard responses like, "oh, yes I'm combining many of my trips to the store, and the pharmacist and the bar."  Or, " well I've taken to riding my bike more, and using light rail."  But as we've already observed this is not a normal day.

(I have to carefully present this response.  I was given permission to share it with the class, and I'm assuming this person would be willing to let me share with the broader audience.  But I'm a "GOOD GUY!"  So I am going to change the name of the responder and the destination to which she refers.  I hope that covers me.)

So Lucy Lovesick responds,

"Oh, yeah. I used to drive out to Limon every weekend.  I'm not doing that any more. (That is about 80 miles east of Denver.)"

So...smart ___ that I can be,  I respond, "I guess that means HE's going to have to drive into Denver?"

Sometimes you just get lucky. Lucy says, "Nope, we're just going to break up."

"I'm sorry," I say.  "Don't you like this guy?"

"Oh, yeah, I like him a lot!"

"Well then his commitment must be weak?"

"No, he likes me a lot, too!"

"So this is all about the price of a gallon of gas?"

"Yep!"

So there it is folks, a story right in front of us.  Gas prices are breaking up CLOSE PERSONAL HUMAN relationships. Will we be able to keep our families together?  I HOPE YOU'RE SATISFIED OPEC!

Well it is supposed to be back up into the 60's tomorrow. SO....? Well you'll be glad to know, NO MORE SNOW! 

If you let it, TRUTH trumps FICTION every single time!

Hey there smiley!

Meet my step granddaughter Maren Noel. It is my first HUMAN BABY watercolor portrait.  I doubt I captured every nuance.  But I do feel like I snagged a piece of her happy soul. This little girl is going to keep everybody in stitches.

But on that happy note?  Let me ask a few questions. If this comes off as some journalistic jingo arrogance, so be it. SOMETIMES a BLOG has to let you expel your demons.

In every Presidential political race year my brain  gets bombarded with a host of 'WHYs?'

Why is everybody so ANGRY?

Why do we need superlatives to make our choices?

Why do we circle the wagons every four years?

Why do candidates hide behind the pretense of intellectual sincerity,  when WE all know a whole bunch of other people are telling them how to behave and what to say.

Why do these candidates make promises that both THEY and WE know they can't and won't keep.

I hope you'll not challenge my patriotism with this last WHY, but I can take it if you do.

Why do we believe that for sure this is the most judicious and efficient form of government on the planet...WAIT....WAIT a MINUTE...that wasn't SUPERLATIVE enough....Not ON THE PLANET...but IN THE  WHOLE UNIVERSE?

I don't expect any answers to some WHY'S I've been asking all my adult life. 

I'm just going spend the rest of my night HOPING little Maren Noel won't have to mess with them when she's my age. Of course she'll be wanting to know WHY I didn't get her nose just right.    

"Nuttin' Honey!"

"Johnny is a JOkEr"

In my day rock lyrics really meant something.  Take the Everly Brothers for instance. Ponder the depth of meaning when they belt out the words...

"Johnny is a JOKER,

 

He's a BIRD

 

A very funny joker, HE'S A BIRD.

 

 

 

But when he jokes my honey?

 

 

 

 

He's a DOG

 

 

His jokin' ain't so funny,

 

What a dog

 

 

Johnny is a joker

 

 

That's tryin' to steal my honey,

 

 

 

He's a BIRD

 

Dog....."

 

I kind of enjoy these days when my friend Bugs

 

 gets to say..."That's all folks!"

 

 

I believe we've GROUND TO A HALT!

Aunt Lola

Laugh for us one last time! 

My aunt Lola died this week, peacefully in her sleep. She was on my mother's side, a Thompson. Big deal?  Well first of all Aunt Lola was in her mid 90's.  I think that is still kind of a big deal.  And another big deal?

 

She was the last survivor of this family of nine  kids raised during the great depression in dust bowl Kansas.  Just off the top you'd know that had to give you a lot of character. But it also made it possible for all the Thompson kids to BECOME characters. Lola may have led the pack. Somehow Elmer and Murrell Thompson found a way during the turmoil of the times to let the Thompson kids be themselves, think outside the box (Elmer was a one room school house teacher), find their own paths in life.

And, oh my, what wonderful story tellers they all were. When all nine of them were together there was no sense in trying to get in the middle of the conversation. They all knew the road map, but it would have been dangerous for anyone else to do anything but sit on the curb, and listen and laugh.  And I don't think there can ever be a dispute about this.  Aunt Lola was the LAUGH LEADER.

She was the shortest of the nine, but not the least heard.  When she let go with her gleeful explosions I don't think it would be much of an exaggeration to say you could hear her a block away.  Now don't let me give you the impression that that is all she did.  When I was around, and admittedly that wasn't much, she would always have some sharp words for sons Bill and Errol. They didn't exactly grow up in choir robes.

But I have to tell you less than a minute into a tirade she would catch herself and turn it into a cacophony of guffaws. Her laughter was always joyous, never mean.  If you'd ask her secret to long life I'm not sure what she'd say.  But those who've known her would have to say it had to have been that unflappable positive outlook and that wonderful laugh.  (I hope someone has recorded it.)

Well anyway, I and a couple million (exaggeration) first cousins, are orphans. For me and my sisters that is now on both sides of the family. 

There is an infamous media story here in town of a reporter interviewing a mother in grief over her kidnapped and missing daughter? That reporter in the excitement of the news gathering moment reportedly said, "I know just how you feel. I lost a cat once." I suppose it is tough to forgive the apparent arrogance of that remark. But as I'm sitting here I'm starting to understand. It really depends on how attached she was to that cat, doesn't it?

It's clearly justified that I lost ten pounds of tears when my own parents died.

 

Mom

But in my case? Let's see, aunt Marge, uncle Gabe, and uncle Rudy, all on my father's side, gone over the past three years. Uncle Art died a long time ago. Then, on my Mom's side there was uncle Virgil, a long, long time ago, aunt Gladys and uncle Forest quite a while ago, uncles Dicky and Danny over the past decade, followed by aunts Velma, Theda and Lola in the past five years. 

I can't match the grief of the Lola Woolen family right now. But I think I can tell you I'm missing a lot of cats.

Let me tell you if they put all those Thompson kids in the same room up there, they better pad the walls with acoustical clouds.  If they don't nobody in heaven is going to get any sleep.  Come on Lola lets hear it just ONE MORE TIME!