and in this corner...

January 7, 1982

2012-01-08T09:49:00.000-06:00

It was brought to our attention last week that there has been a dearth of controversial letters to the editor in the N.V.N. lately. There are those among us, it seems, who would rather read a saucy note condemning the editor for his shortsightedness than a sociable listing of who went where for dinner. So we promised to do what we could in the next few weeks to foster a certain level of local outrage.
We considered writing a lengthy editorial espousing the virtues of turning off the Pretty Prairie siren permanently. The siren, after all, was the focal point of a good number of letters to the editor in 1981.
But no, that was last year’s controversy and we must move forward in our pursuit of outrage.
Cults have served us well in the past. Some of the most blisteringly eloquent letters we have ever received dealt with cults.
But, no, cults just aren’t “in” anymore. What with unemployment, inflation, Poland, and Rubic Cubes, nobody is too concerned about cults these days.
Politics, however, is always in season. The state legislature convenes next week with a variety of items on the agenda, ranging from prison reform to deteriorating highways to perimutual wagering. While our honorable legislators are diligently contemplating our best interests, there is another consideration which should be added to the legislature docket—our elected officials should vote to make it illegal to grow wheat in Kansas.
Granted, it’s a radical notion, but it may be just what our ailing farm economy needs. Farmers have been wounded by high interest rates, low commodity prices, and government interference. The Carter Administration embargoed grain sales to the Soviet Union and wheat prices fell. The threat of a renewal of such an embargo by the Reagan Administration has again caused prices to plummet. With interest rates at stultifyingly high levels it is no wonder much of the joy has been taken from the farm.
Hence, it is time the family wheat farm was outlawed. The advantages to farmers would be many.
First, prohibiting a product is the perfect way to increase demand. As soon as you tell someone he can’t have something, it is precisely what he most desires. Prohibition did nothing to rid the nation of its alcoholic thirst. If anything, it heightened it—people who had never tasted rotgut whiskey suddenly longed for the romance of sipping illegal booze. The illegality of drug usage is certainly one of its most endearing charms.
For decades the Kansas Wheat Commission has, with dubious result, attempted to get people to eat more bread. All it would take to increase demand drastically would be to tell people they can no longer have Kansas wheat and the thing they would most want is a loaf of whole wheat bread. People would certainly pay more than $3.70 a bushel.
Meeting the rising demand would present no problem. Since we rarely see a state or even a county law enforcement official out here in the country, farmers could continue growing wheat with impunity.
If wheat farming were illegal, there would be a huge influx of capital into the state. Mafia cash, laundered Republican Party money, and big labor slush funds would suddenly be made available to farmers who were involved in the illicit production of wheat. Interest rates would go down due to the availability of funds.
Finally, because wheat would technically be illegal the federal government would be unable to embargo foreign sales. They never embargo sales of marijuana to the Soviet Union, do they?
The farmers’ associations, tractorcades, and rallies have done little to enhance the plight of the American wheat farmer. So now we must turn to our legislators for aid. It’s time they acted together to save the family wheat farm in Kansas. It is time they took bold action to preserve the golden wheat fields of the American plains. It is time the legislature talked about something besides school finance, highway improvement, and the severance tax.
It is time wheat was outlawed in the state of Kansas….

June 24, 1982

2010-07-05T21:24:00.000-06:00

June 24, 1982

Scientists, theologians, and poets have struggled for centuries for an understanding of life. Moralists ponder life’s beginning and its end. We guard against aborting life almost as vigorously as we guard against euthanasia.
Life is sacred, something to be preserved, and yet it remains a mystery. Scientists explain it in terms of amino acids and electric charges. Theologians discuss its worth in terms of destiny.
Poets are neither so basic nor so eternal. Robert Browning wrote, “I count life just a stuff, to try the soul’s strength on…” Keats called human life, “the war, the deeds, the disappointments, the anxiety, imagination’s struggles, far and nigh…”
But poetic phrases don’t explain life—life defies grand exhaltations. When the pretense, scientific verbage, theological summation, and poetry is stripped away what remains is a steady stream of insignificant events. Taken together, these easily forgotten experiences form life.
Life is trying to remember the last time you changed the oil in the car. It is telling a joke and forgetting the punch line. Life is a wedding band that has cut off the circulation in your ring finger.
Life is a lawnmower that won’t start, a fight that will, and a payment plan that won’t end. It is a bruised fingernail, a weak knee, a tennis elbow. It is tripping on the family dog and spending a week in the hospital recuperating. Life is placing a wreath of flowers on the grave of a grandmother.
Major events give life ambition, but the trivial give it texture and definition.
Life is defined by carsickness on a vacation, a scar on the foot, a new shirt on the first day of school, a solid hit at the baseball game. Life is scoring a long touchdown and having it called back for a penalty, having a homerun curve foul, missing a shot at the buzzer.
Life is sitting on the bench thinking about getting into the game. It is the bad-hop grounder that chips your tooth. It’s the pain in your lower back when your playing days are over.
Life is hail and snow drifts and lightning flashes and being forced into the basement by the wind. It is mornings in coats and long johns and it is shirtless afternoons. It is watching a thundercloud billow over a ripe wheat field. Life is finding out your camping tent is not waterproof.
Life is finding that special person who laughs at your wit even when you’re not funny. It is sitting up late at night with sick children. It is a kiss before supper. Life is making a mistake and feeling so sorry your bones ache.
We are all so busy with the process of living we sometimes fail to recognize life.
Life is wondering how you would look with a different hair style. It is longing for the days when you had hair. It is standing in front of a mirror gazing at your own reflection. Life is wondering whose life it is you are leading.
Life is a difficult, glorious enterprise that brings bruises and bliss. Perhaps Thomas Hobbes defined life best—“solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”... ~T.Stucky

June 9, 1982

2010-07-05T21:18:00.000-06:00

June 9, 1982

The weeds are green and abundant, the sidewalk is littered with skateboards, bicycles, and popsicle sticks, and the air is filled with the sound of breaking windows.
It’s summertime at the Stucky house.
In the two weeks since teachers handed out grade cards and sent their charges home to harass their parents, three windows have been shattered. The hasty explanations rendered have gone from the slightly believable (I was just throwing the ball against the side of the house and it slipped.) to the unbelievable (I don’t know who broke it, but I’m sure it wasn’t me.) to the incredible (I don’t know how, it just broke.).
It’s summertime at the Stucky house.
The kitchen floor is sticky with kool-aid dropped from paper cups. The chain on every bike has come off at least once. The short people have begun discarding summer toys. The latch on the front door has been broken off.
It’s summertime at the Stucky house.
We have already gone through twenty books from the Pretty Prairie library—everything from “Blaze and the Indian Cave” (“It was good, Blaze and his owner rode around with their cowboy friend Jim and he asks if he can camp out in an Indian cave and they like the…”) to “How Doofus the Dragon lost His Head” (“Pretty good. It was sorta funny, but he really didn’t lose his head, he fell into a field and then they hid him in a hay stack and…”). We have made feeble attempts at banjo lessons (“My fingers don’t stretch that far.”), guitar lessons (It hurts my fingers.”), and tennis lessons (“This racquet is too heavy.”). Baseball practice has been missed three times. We have already heard “There’s nothing to do around here.”
It’s summertime at the Stucky house.
A mosquito bite caused Carly’s right eye to swell shut. A damaged ankle made it difficult for Emily to walk. Aaron fell off his bike and wounded his knee. Allison has a cut on her head. The dog has been in heat, attracting every male canine within a two county radius. Four Mississippi kites, a prairie falcon, two cardinals, three turkey vultures, and “something weird” have been spotted in the evening sky.
It’s summertime at the Stucky house.
A host of hamburgers and two chickens have already been burned on the barbecue. Each of the short people has already said numerous times, “Tell me, dad, why do hamburgers and chicken legs end up looking the same when you barbecue them?” More than a dozen glasses of iced tea have been spilled at the supper table, two popsicles have melted on the front porch, three lady bugs have been loosed in the living room, two tennis balls have been misplaced, a can of “Off” has been depleted, two baseball mitts have been left out in the rain, and a wheel has fallen off the lawnmower.
This is only the first week in June. The air conditioner has not been turned on yet. The rodeo is still a month away. And already the first day of school is poised on the distant horizon like a brimming pot of gold….~T.Stucky

March 15, 1979

2009-03-08T09:28:00.002-06:00

It starts with a small but significant sensation in the lower chest; a peculiar feeling that things are changing, that the seemingly eternal cold of winter may indeed be coming to an end.
At first it is almost undetectable. It grows as slowly as the snow drifts melt. But with a few days of balmy temperatures and clear skies, the feeling builds, and things do change.
Suddenly it becomes visible. The first sign is a tuft of weedy grass in the front yard. Then a robin appears to pluck a moist worm from the soft soil. Geese and ducks fill the sky, noisily headed north, headed home with the elation of the season. New-born lambs and calves bound across open fields with an air of freedom previously covered by layers of snow.
Spring is here and the entire universe is alive with it. Wheat fields are lush green and growing. The sky is baby blue. The bleakness of winter is gone.
No less obvious than the changing surroundings are the changes in people. They have come out of hibernation and are actively taking advantage of the warmth. They are biking, jogging, or just walking. Motorcycles are revved up and tennis rackets are unfettered. People are stepping lively with enthusiastic smiles that glow like the spring sun. Overcoats and long johns are replaced with shorts and t-shirts. Conversations tend to be more optimistic, more ebullient, more hurried. There are things to do. The siege is over.
Warnings from the weatherman that winter's fury may reappear go unheeded. This is no time for dissension; no one has the right to break this spell, this captivation which has permeated us. The days do not require warning, rather they beg for reverence. They call for veneration in the budding of trees, the building of nests, the brilliance of faces, and the blossoming of emotions.
It is not a time for reality. Reality merely masks the magic. It is not a time for analysis. Rather, it is a time for submission; a submission to the world of life which is being reborn. It is a mystical time of wondrous miracles.
The next ten weeks are the cream of the year, the heart of our lives, the essence of our souls. The next ten weeks are as close to heaven as Kansas can get.
Grab a hunk of spring now before July comes and the opportunity has passed.... ~T.Stucky

March 1, 1984

2009-03-01T14:44:00.001-06:00

People are tripping over themselves in a mad dash to pat February on the back. Editors of daily newspapers have called February 1984 “very, very good.” Others have praised its shiny days and comfortable nights. Everywhere people are raising their voices in praise of this blessed month.
Bah! Sure we haven’t had a blizzard this month. Granted, it was pleasant to have 50-degree-plus temperatures on more than twenty of February’s days. Certainly it was nice to let the snowshovel collect dust on the back porch.
But let’s not get carried away folks. Remember last February? Remember the February before that? And the one before that?
To run around praising this nasty month for simply easing the siege is like smiling at the bully when, for only a moment, he stops kicking you in the head. This “very, very good” month will be back next year as surly as ever. And it won’t matter a bit that we said kind things about it this year.
So, while you still have a chance before March blows you away, say something derogatory about February. It deserves it….~T.Stucky

February 8, 1979

2009-02-05T19:51:00.004-06:00

We live in a time when even the most innocent of events and actions are magnified, examined, and psychoanalyzed in an attempt to decipher ultimates amid the irrelevant.
Depression during the Christmas holidays is examined and reexamined in search of some grandiose anthropological truth. The movies we watch or don't watch supposedly reveal deep inner secrets. The kind of car we drive mirrors our psychological shortcomings.
Never was this psycho-phenomenon more apparent than after this year's Super Bowl. Columnists near and far wrote of the game not in terms of completions and fumbles but in the vernacular of eternal morality, ultimate truth, and societal implications.
The Hutch News editorialized the event as "looniness, an irrational event...mass hysteria with no evil motive...a dramatic reflection of the way we live, violence and committee meetings." Others in the news media referred to the "decadence" of the activities surrounding the game, saying it "exemplified the corruption in our culture." Others pondered it's "historical interpretations."
It's time to call a spade a little metal tool for digging. The Super Bowl is no doubt over-done; few of the games could have been called super, but who cares? It captures the imagination of the American people and it replaces Iran in the headlines for a week. What evil lurks in that?
Sure it's an irrational event; but why this sudden call for rationality? Life and death are irrational. The major events in our lives have little to do with logic. Why should our sporting events be bound to the mundanity of rationality?
Just give us the Super Bowl and let us watch it in peace. If ultimate truths about our society need to be found, why not search for them where cultural truth can best be deciphered -- on television commercials.... ~T.Stucky

January 15, 1981

2009-01-04T16:21:00.003-06:00

It's a difficult world when you're five years old. The wind carries magic, there are ghosts in the boughs of trees, people are twice your size, and time is something you don't learn about until second grade.
Insignificant, seemingly mundane things take on grand importance. Having twenty-five cents for the grocery store is cause for exaltation. Losing that same twenty-five cents is cause for tears.
In such a world waling home from school, a brief eighth of a mile by the odometer, is a long, treacherous excursion through unexplored land, replete with deadly beasts and dangerous terrain.
Aaron lives in such a world. His forty-five minute walk home, a walk which by all rights should take ten minutes, is never boring. A few weeks ago he arrived home and, throwing his coat on the floor where it belongs, he said, "You should have seen this light I saw!"
"You saw a light?" we responded, thing of the Damascus road.
"Yeh, I was walking down the road, you know, the one that goes by that tall building; the one with the cracked window on the one side and the little hole for the cats to hide in on the other side?"
Not wishing to act as though we were unfamiliar with the town, we nodded assuredly.
"Well, I was walking down that road and way off I saw a light. I started watching it 'cause I didn't know that it was and I fell over a rock. You should see the rocks they have down there. They are beautiful! I was laying there, down by that building, you know, the one with the broken window on the side, looking at the rocks. Here, let me show you. I brought some home."
We examined the beautiful brown rocks.
"Have you ever seen rocks like this before? I think the only place in the world you can find them is down by that old building, the one with the broken window on the side. Anyway, I was gathering the rocks when I saw my shoe string was broke. So I tried to fix it but I didn't do a very good job. You know that kid in my class? I forgot what his name is - he can't even tie his shoes yet. Brother! Do we have anything to eat? I got pretty hungry walking home."
We again asked about the light.
"Oh yeh. After I put these rocks in my pocket, I saw the light again, only now it was even bigger. It was almost as big as the sun. Can it hurt you to stand in the sun? There's this kid in my class who says the sun is our enemy. This other kid told him he was stupid. Is the sun really our enemy? Have you ever seen rocks like that before? I think there's a mine down there by that old building with the broken window. Those look like gold rocks, don't they? Look how they shine when you hold them like this."
The light was mentioned again.
"Yeh, well when I stood up the light was huge. I sure am hungry. When are we going to eat? You know what this kid brought for show and tell today? His own tooth! He said he pulled it out just to get money and so he could come to school and show it to us. Brother! Why do teeth fall out? Nothing else falls out, does it?"
About that light.
"Oh, yeh, it was a train. It almost killed me. It was just a little light and then all of a sudden it was a train. You should've seen me jump out of the way. I almost jumped over that building down there, the one with the broken window on the side."
The world of a five year old is a difficult place to live. It is a difficult world for parents as well.... ~T-Stucky

January 18, 1979

2009-01-04T16:00:00.003-06:00

The clock on the wall said 12:00 midnight. The wind was pounding against the north wall and, although the blowing snow made it impossible to see beyond the front porch, it was obviously morning. There was no electricity, the temperature inside the house was 54 degrees, and the only thing warm was the milk in the refrigerator. The burners on the gas stove were turned on and the vigil began.
Sensing that something extraordinary was going on, the short people were crazy with energy. Their actions resulted in louder spoken words.
"Keep the door closed so it stays warm in the kitchen!" "You put your hands any closer to that burner and you're on fire!" "No, it's too cold to go outside and play!" "The kitchen is no place to play tag!" The clock on the wall said 12:00 midnight.
A quick trip was made to Kuhn's store for batteries and other necessities. The wind literally took your breath away and, even with four layers of clothing, the cold was penetrating. The voice on the radio said the wind chill factor was 45 degrees below zero. Suddenly, it seemed colder.
After a meal of soup and optimistic conversation, ("The power will come on shortly, it can't stay off much longer, the new Governor won't allow it.") the afternoon is spent gazing out the window, playing backgammon, and periodically thawing out hands over the burner.
Evening comes. Dinner is prepared and eaten by candlelight. It now becomes apparent that we will have to sleep on the floor near the kitchen. The short people are ecstatic, "We don't have to take baths and we get to sleep with all our clothes on!"
Parents are not quite so moved. Water barely drips from the faucet and all the little folks decide they are intolerably thirsty. Now they all have to use the bathroom. The stool is no longer functioning. It is time for rationing. It is 12:00 midnight.
Morning comes cold and the big people plan to stay in bed; the short people plan differently. Another day begins without a bath. The air in the kitchen gets heavier. The milk, placed on the porch the night before, is frozen solid. More than once someone says, "This is ridiculous."
The phone rings with confirmation that there are others in a similar state. A certain delight comes from explaining how bad things are. "Did you hear the chill factor was 45 below? We're all sitting in the kitchen. Our toilet won't flush."
Time begins to drag. After losing four consecutive games of backgammon, the thrill is gone. A walk around the block relieves cabin fever slightly, but it pains the toes and the face. And that clock, that disgusting clock, still has both hands straight up.
The short people are preparing for prayer before the evening meal. "Put in a plug for the electricity while you're at it" they are prompted. No one is laughing. Candles flicker throughout the meal and yet one must look closely to see if it's a green bean or a piece of meat you're eating. The ice cream planned for desert is in a puddle in the now-warm freezer.
After dinner, recalling that Abe Lincoln became President by reading by candlelight, we sought similar results. A headache was our reward.
Snow is scooped from a porch, melted in a pot, and poured into the stool. "Hey," yells the short person, "We can flush the toilet!" After forty-six hours in the dark, flushing the toilet has become exciting. As the toilet flushes, the clock says 12:00 midnight.
And then, abruptly, the siege is over. Lights flash on, the furnace blows warm air, and the clock changes position. Never have light, water, and warmth been so appreciated. Never again will they be taken for granted.... ~T.Stucky

December 18, 1986

2008-12-21T20:20:00.003-06:00

Thursday morning at 6:30 we said our brief, encouraging good-byes. Dad managed a weak smile, gave a thumbs-up sign, and the elevator doors closed.
We stood, four grown children and a mother, in a still-quiet University of Arizona Medical Center hall and watched the doors slide shut. We had been apprised of the risks of the operation. The heart, wounded years ago by rheumatic fever, was enlarged. A valve was not functioning properly. Most likely, a metallic valve would need to be implanted to replace the defect. He's not a young man anymore. Certainly the risks are not to be taken lightly.
What must dad be thinking as the door slides us from his vision? He is barely dressed in a hospital-issue gown, lying on a gurney being pushed by the volunteer aide who woke him early and shaved his chest, stomach, and thighs. Now he feels the unsettling drop of the elevator taking him to the operating room.
He, too, knows the risk. He, more keenly than anyone, knows how permanent could be the closing of the doors. What dad thought that morning is known only to him. I'd like to think he thought about the good time-the summer vacations, the Christmas mornings, the summer baseball games, the grandchildren in his lap.
But he didn't have much time to think that morning before the anesthesiologist did his job. We, standing on the other side of the door, were the ones cursed with thought. This should have been said. That should have been made clear. We were there when the doors closed, but was that a strong enough statement? Shouldn't we have told him how important he is to us? How much we love him?
For dad Thursday morning was a short, induced snooze. For us in the waiting room it was interminable. Attempts to lose time in magazine articles or television programs were unsuccessful. The risks. The risks were always there, blurring the print, pushing the television out of focus.
And then Dr. Jack Copeland strolled into the waiting room. Dr. Copeland, nationally recognized for his heart research, had the night before transplanted a healthy heart into a Navajo Indian man. In the span of 48 hours he would repair major damage to five hearts. And after each operation he would walk into the waiting room, as if he were a mere mortal, and inform the family of the outcome.
Dad's heart was strong, he said. The valve was reparable and so no replacement was necessary. He'll be fine and should be back on his feet in a few days.
Later we would learn more of the specifics of the operation-how the heart was lifted from his chest and repaired, how it was shocked back to life, how the trauma of the operation combined with the medicine causes amnesia and ICU psychosis. We would learn about the pain and anxiety of recovery.
But we would also feel a steady, strong heart beat. And we would talk about the future.
In this season celebrated for the gift of a Son, four children Thursday afternoon celebrated the gift of a father.... ~T.Stucky

November 23, 1978

2008-11-22T20:47:00.002-06:00

Thanksgiving is like the two-minute warning in football. Time-out is called, the players and coaches are informed the game's end is near, and then the action continues with hasty zeal. Such is Thanksgiving.
It is a brief time-out when we slow down, assess the preceeding months, and ponder the remaining five weeks of the year.
The weather has changed quickly; days are now cold and short, the brightness that was summer is gone, replaced with first a colorful splash of autumn and then the grey of winter. Change is all around. We have new politicians, new coats, new tires. Talk is of football and basketball instead of baseball. Christmas lists are beginning to fill in. We are building quickly toward the culmination of another year.
Then, in the midst of all that change, we are presented with a soothing tradition-Thanksgiving. A day that has not really changed in the last 100 years. Oh, we do require turkey now instead of chicken. And instead of going down into the basement for embellishments we just open a can. We watch television now when the dinner is complete instead of pitching horseshoes in the yard. But the most important thing about Thanksgiving has remained unaltered-the family is still the heart and soul of the celebration.
Norman Rockwell, who will be keenly missed this holiday season, captured the essence of the day in his precise painting of the Thanksgiving table; a family of young and old line the table with knowing winds and expectant smiles, while at the center is the smoking, juicy turkey. The picture radiates warmth, comfort, and love; the feelings of Thanksgiving.
The timing of Thanksgiving is one of its finest elements. (Would turkey and dressing taste the same in July?) It comes after the hardest work of the year is over, and just before we are confronted with the chaos of Christmas and New Year.
It is the two-minute warning of the year; the calming time-out.
Yet, it is also a notice that time does continue to slip by. A subtle reminder that we are all getting older. A mention that the game is yet to be finished.... ~T.Stucky

November 22, 1984

2008-11-22T20:38:00.001-06:00

“But just for a moment now we’re all together, Mama, just for a moment let’s be happy. Let’s look at one another. It goes so fast.”
The words are Emily’s in Thornton Wilder’s play “Our Town.” The sentiments are universal.
Emily is talking of childhood, of family, of life. Before we can hold it, examine it, and love it as we should, it slips from us. We never seem to appreciate what we have until it’s gone.
Home is that magical, mystical, terrible place where most of our life passes. “Home,” wrote Robert Frost, “is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” It is the place we “somehow haven’t to deserve.”
Home is where life is capsulized. It is the place where hallmarks are preserved—those pencil marks on the wall measuring the growth of children, the family album with the important photographs, the box of mementos in the closet. Home is the secret place where the Christmas presents are hid.
Home is where little girls dress up in mom’s old clothes and cover their faces with makeup. It’s where boys toss baseballs through windows. Home is also where children suddenly grow too big to sit on dad’s lap. It’s where they outgrow Halloween and the Easter Bunny. Home is where the true identity of Santa Claus is revealed.
Home is for laughter. The delight of first steps, the chuckles of last laughs, the snickers of sisters and the giggles of brothers fill the home with the best of life.
Home is also raised voices and silent quarrels. It’s where the phone rings in the middle of the night to tell of a relative’s death. Home is where you go to cry.
But we are so close to home, so caught up in life, that we can’t see it clearly. We treat our days like habits. The joys come, the sorrows follow. First New Year, then July 4th, then Christmas. The field must be worked, the deadline must be met, the dishes must be washed, the dog must be fed. And we do work the field and we meet the deadline and we wash the dishes and feed the dog. The machinery continues to rumble on. And only when it rumbles past do we catch a glimpse of what we have lost.
“It goes so fast. We don’t have time to look at one another. I didn’t realize. So all that was going on and we never noticed. Oh earth, you’re too wonderful for anyone to realize.” The words are Wilder’s, the thoughts are everyone’s.
Yet, there is one time of year we have granted ourselves a breathtaking. Thanksgiving is the ideal holiday at the perfect time of year. The year’s work is winding down, the chaos of Christmas is weeks away, the cool days beckon for a slower pace. Thanksgiving is the holiday for reflection—for assessing our accomplishments, for setting our goals, for looking at each other, for checking the marks in the hall, for adding new photos to the album, for holding children close.
Thanksgiving is a time for stopping for a moment and being happy with what we have. Tomorrow new marks may be added in the hall, the phone may ring in the night, a joy may be lost.
But we have today. It may go fast and we may not deserve it, but we can realize it if only we will take the time to look at each other…. ~T.Stucky

November 20, 1986

2008-11-02T09:36:00.002-06:00

How many times while sitting in algebra class did you ask yourself why in the world you were there? The obvious response was that you had to pass algebra to get out of high school. But the obvious response didn't come close to answering the larger question.
How is the quality of life improved by knowing how to solve the unknowns in an algebraic equation? The question has been asked by struggling students since the days of Socrates. ("oh, come on, Socrates! Couldn't you just tell us another nice allegory about a cave rather than make us solve this equation?)
Similar questions about the merits of English class, geography class and even beginning math class are given prompt and satisfying replies. We will always, even in our adult stage, have a need for speaking properly. We will always, even in advancing age, need to know which way is up.
But do we really need to know how to solve for x in the equation 4x+c=a-(x+3)? Understanding the rudiments of logic, we were told back in high school, will prove of great worth in the theatre of life. We responded by saying every theatre we had ever been in posted the price of popcorn in dollars and cents, not x's and a's.
So then the teacher, who must have long ago discovered teaching algebra was easier than justifying it, said algebra was something that would come in handy when we were older, regardless of what our occupation would be. The only kid in the class who knew what he wanted to be when he grew up (a nuclear physicist) nodded his head in agreement. The rest of us had no inkling what our future held, but we knew if it held algebra we would cling tenaciously to the past.
We kept asking throughout the year, as the equations got more and more complicated, what the point of all this figuring was. Often we asked the question when papers were returned covered with more red ink than the federal deficit. The response, from a teacher weary of responding, was simply a silent glare.
We stumbled through the course, passed narrowly, and graduated into the real world. As the years went by our journey toward being grown up was haunted by the thought that sooner or later we would be forced to solve an algebraic equation, we would have to use advanced mathematical logic. Like some ghost concocted of x's, a's and b's, it loomed over our path.
But it never came down. We went from this job to that, experienced these and those, went hither and yon, and not once were we asked to be logical, not once did we have to solve for x. We kept expecting the worst and it never came. That fear, instilled when we were impressionable youths, we decided was merely a mean-spirited ploy of an algebra teacher intent on making us complete our homework. The answer to "Why am I in algebra class" we concluded was "For no reason at all."
Or so we thought.
Last week the tallest of the short people came home from school with an innocent looking piece of paper. At the top was mimeographed "A real world problem." Below was printed.
"A certain breed of cow has the following characteristics: at the age of 3, and every year thereafter, it gives birth to a new female; each of these goes through the same cycle. Now, disregarding males and deaths, how many cows would there be in the herd after 20 years if a farmer started with one such animal at birth?"
There it was! The ghost we thought we had dispelled. Brought to us on a white piece of paper by our first born!
"Can you help me with this?" she asked, knowing from experience that we would.
We read the question, shrugged our shoulders, handed it back to her and walked away, shoulders down. She stood there in painful disbelief, looking like a child who has just had her fingers inadvertently slammed in a door by a parent.
In that look the answer to the eternal question of why we take algebra class was revealed.... ~T.Stucky

November 2, 1989

2008-11-02T09:15:00.002-06:00

(Offered without apology to Robert Fulghum but with apologies to school teachers everywhere.)

Everything I really needed to know I learned the first day of Little League practice.
* Prepare for life with the proper equipment. If you're going to be a first baseman, get a first baseman's glove. If you're going to be an outfielder, get yourself an outfielder's glove, and if you want to be a catcher make sure all your important parts are adequately protected.
* It's all right if teammates slap you on the butt.
* If the opposing pitcher throws the ball at your head, duck.
* Be pleasant to umpires; they hold a ball/strike counter in one hand, and your fate in the other.
* Smile at your parents in the bleachers; they are the only ones who won't hate you if you strike out with the bases loaded.
* Never strike out with the bases loaded. Even parents can take only so much.
* Keep your eye on the ball at all times. A line drive to the nose can ruin an otherwise good day and spoil your chances to be a television newscaster.
* Sometimes the best team doesn't win.
* If you hit the ball, run. If you miss, try again.
* Use excuses (The sun got in my eyes. It took a bad bounce. The wind must have caught it.) as seldom as possible.
* When you win, shake the other teams' hands. When you lose, shake the other team's hands.
* If you get hit by a hard grounder, throw the runner out before crying.
* If you hit a home run, make sure your mother is watching.
* Coaches think they know everything' humor them by pretending they do.
* Backup your teammates.
* Even if you are scared senseless, step into the batter's box confidently. Everybody's scared, some just don't show it.
* Don't chatter. If you have something important to say, speak, clearly and loudly.
* Don't laugh at your teammates' mistakes. Your mistakes will come and teammates have long memories.
* Make sure your hat is on straight.
* If you hit a home run, smile to yourself. If someone else hits a home run, smile to them.
* If you are at bat in the bottom of the last inning with the score tied and a runner at third, remember this: we reside on a small planet on the inner edge of a galaxy which is one hundred thousand light years across-one of some hundred thousand million known galaxies. ~T.Stucky

October 19, 1978

2008-10-25T09:34:00.002-06:00

Everyone is aware that the cost of things has increased. What is often overlooked, however, is the riding cost of nothing. Nowhere is inflation more pronounced than in the price we pay for absolutely nothing.
For example, the natural gas bill at the N.V.N office was $3.89 throughout the summer months. We do not use a hot water heater and when it was 110 degrees outside we never felt compelled to light the furnace. So the cost for exactly no natural gas was almost $4 a month.
The next shocker is electricity. We are informed by the electric company that the minimum expense for us is $1.55. If everything was shut down and we were burning candles for light, we would still be charged $1.55 for the potential of using electricity.
Last, but obviously not least, is the telephone bill. For the luxury of being able to make a call, whether a call is made or not, we are charged $21.08 per month. Because we use the phone a great deal, our cost is substantially more than that. But, if we used our phone for a conversation piece and not a conversing piece, we would still be charged $21.08 every month.
This brings the total bill for nothing to $26.52. It could be argued that nothing is not what it used to be.... ~T.Stucky

October 11, 1979

2008-10-10T05:54:00.002-06:00

Having two youngsters at the N.V.N. office during business hours often results in unusual phone conversations. Last THursday, for example:
"Hello, is this the Ninnescah Valley News?"
"Yes."
"May I talk to the editor please?"
"This is he."
"I'm Barbara Dickerson calling from Washington, D.C. to invite you (Emily, get that out of your mouth.) to the National Kansas Leadership Briefing to be held in (Aaron, can you get her down from there before she breaks her head.) Washington from November 28 until December 1. It will be the first time (Emily, I can't hear with you banging the desk.) since Kansas became a state in 1861 that its leaders have been invited to (Hey, get your sucker out of her hair.) Washington to share their views about America's future. After reviewing more than 5000 names submitted to our office we have (Cute, now get the pencil out of your nose.) selected you as part of the cross-section of outstanding individuals with varying backgrounds and professions to whom (Emily, just use the crayon on the paper not on the wall.) to extend this invitation to participate. Your views about America's future, and Kansas' role in it, are important (Aaron, does she look like a fly to you? Put the flyswatter down.) and need to be shared both with national leaders and your peers. We would like to invite you to attend because (Oh, Jeez. Emily get that beetle out of your mouth.) we feel that as one of the young leader of Kansas you would be a benefit to the briefing. Are you interested in attending?"
"Let me get this (Emily get down from there.) straight. You have decided that out of the 2,300,000 people who live in Kansas, I am one of the (Go get a kleenex.) 500 considered to be leaders?"
"That's correct."
"That, in itself (Give me those scissors.) tells me a great deal about (Aaron you're going to break it.) America's future and Kansas' role (Will you please spit that beetle out.) in it.... ~T. Stucky

October 9, 1986

2008-10-10T05:52:00.001-06:00

There was an estate sale in our neighborhood Saturday. The elderly couple who called the house home for decades are now living in a nursing home so they no longer needed the furniture, lawn equipment, and paraphernalia accumulated during the years of their married life.
Family members and friends spent weeks helping the couple prepare for the auction; cleaning, collecting, sorting items. No small task, this, for each knicknack is weighted to the cupboard by a memory. The dining table, where the family had gathered on holidays, was carried to the front lawn for sale to the highest bidder. The tools were gathered in a box, their usefulness to be transferred to some other owner - never again will the man use a wrench to fix a faucet, never again will the woman hammer a nail into the wall to hang a family photograph.
Estate sales are somber events. Except for the auctioneer who rattles away with his bright voice, sounds are hushed. A funereal pall hangs over the cluttered lawn. Children scooting about, laughing, seem out of place.
People came Saturday and parked their cars for blocks around and walked to the gutted house, its insides now outside. The wind was cool and damp from the north, prompting people to lift their coated shoulders to protect their necks. As they huddled together the people talked quietly about the rain, about milo heads sprouting, about inundated wheat fields.
And as the people talked and the auctioneer chattered, the old couple stood on the fringe watching their life being sold as fifteen cents on the dollar.
In a box of books on the far end of a table was a volume of essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson. The ragged binding indicated the book had been handled often. Pencil underlining marking favorite sentences and ideas confirmed the book's usage.
Particular favor had been given "Compensation," as paragraph after paragraph was emphasized with a leaden undercurrent. The essay begins with a poem:
"The wings of Time are black and white, Pied with morning and with night.
Mountain tall and ocean deep, trembling balance duly keep.
In changing moon, in tidal wave, glows the feud of Want and Have...
And all that Nature made thy own, floating in air and pent in stone.
Will rive the hills and swim the sea, and, like thy shadow, follow thee."
Other ideas had been recognized by the reader; "As no man had ever a point of pride that was not injurious to him, so no man had ever a defect that was not somewhere made useful to him." "The death of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover which seemed nothing but privation, somewhat later assumes they aspect of a guide or genius; for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates an epoch of infancy or of youth, which was waiting to be closed, breaks us from a wonted occupations, or a household, or style of living, and allows the formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character." "Man's life is a progress, and not a station."
People found bargains Saturday and they carried away beds and lamps and tools. And they carried away peices of a life, pieces which will now become part of a different life.
In somber ending there is beginnings. In loss there is progress.... ~T.Stucky

September 6, 1991

2008-09-11T19:32:00.002-06:00

With this issue, the Ninnescah Valley News takes its first toddling steps into the computer age. Using a personal computer and a laser printer, we perform the publishing functions which in earlier times required C.W. Claybaugh to fill a large room with rumbling, whirling, cast iron equipment.
But space-saving and noise-reduction are not the essence of what computers offer. Computers, simply stated, give us time.
It is possible to do all the things a computer does—putting images on paper, calculating large numbers, combining information from a variety of sources—with pen and paper and time. The computer doesn’t do anything that hasn’t been done before, it simply does it faster; giving us time to move on to other things.
(In parentheses we note that no time was saved by our computer system this week. But, we do recognize that once we become more computer-friendly our time spent on-task, as they say in computer manuals, will be significantly reduced, thus giving us time to take advantage of the games package included in the PageMaker program.)
And so, with all this extra time in the final days of the twentieth century, we are able to sit back on the front porch and peruse the 200th anniversary issue of The Old Farmer’s Almanac which arrived this week. The edition, as usual, brims with quirky good news. However, ominously lurking in the back pages is the weather forecast for the Central Great Plains.
First, the quirky good news. According to the Alamanac, if you are an American chatting with a friend in a coffee shop, you will touch each other twice an hour. Two English people would not touch at all, while two French people would touch each other 110 times an hour. Puerto Ricans are handiest of all, touching 180 times an hour.
The Almana reports that the Industrial Revolution prompted the planting of grass lawns, but it was an American who raised the consciousness, and noise-level, of the landed gentry. “In 1919, an American army colonel named Edwin George fell prey to the 20th century predilection for adding motors to machines that had previously been thought to work well without them. Removing the gasoline engine from his wife’s washing machine, he managed to install it on a push mower of the type developed by Budding almost 90 years before. To his satisfaction, he discovered that he could cut grass more loudly than ever before. Mrs. George, presumable, went back to pounding the family’s laundry on a flat stone in the river.”
Good fun prevails in the first half of the Almanac. But then comes the weather report, which is the primary reason people have been buying almanacs for two centuries. Grab your snow boots, folks. The winter we’ve been dreading for the past decade is headed our way.
According to the Almanac, “snowfall will be well above normal…cold spells predominate…colder than normal…”
With the snow drifted in great mounds and the chill factor unbearable, we’ll have plenty of opportunities this winter to sit at the keyboards and save time… ~T.Stucky

September 28, 1990

2008-09-11T19:26:00.001-06:00

It’s time we came out of the closet.
We’ve been reluctant to make this announcement, fearful our few friends would find excuses for not visiting, afraid the neighbors would plop For Sale signs in their front lawns, concerned we may become neighborhood pariahs. But having quietly carried around this secret for three months, it’s time we unburdened ourselves. It’s time we unburdened ourselves. It’s time we confessed, allowing the confessional to cleanse our sullied spirit.
We have a lizard loose in our house. More precisely, we have a gecko roaming free, scurrying on its suction-cup feet across the walls and ceilings.
There, we admit it. We feel better. In fact, we’ve felt somewhat better since the little critter became part of the extended family last summer. While theatres across the nation were showcasing Arachnophobia on the big screen in July, we were confirming that art imitates life by being overrun with brown spiders. The dirty brown, angular, poisonous, nasty demons were everywhere-hiding in socks, in sheets, and (worst of all) in underwear.
In the past we have responded to such invasions with chemical warfare, unleashing deadly poison around baseboards, in closets and down hallways. But, as Saddam knows, chemical warfare is not discriminating; the good die with the bad.
So this summer we determined to use nature to vanquish nature. We bought a house gecko and set him free in an upstairs bedroom.
Now, to quickly dispel the image of a dragon lizard prowling the home, putting children and pets at risk, let us say the gecko is smaller than your hand (unless your hand is bigger than a gecko), it’s dull green, it’s nocturnal, and people in Japan have been using them as residential bugeaters for centuries. Although we know he (or she) is on the job because the spiders are gone, we haven’t seen it for several weeks.
Once you get over the uneasiness of expecting to step on it while walking barefooted down the hall, or having it leap onto your face as you sleep, it’s like having a benevolent reptilian friend waging battle against evil forces.
While our uneasiness about the gecko has calmed, our uneasiness about those other reptilian crime-fighters, The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, continues. When the Turtle rage began we attempted a psychological understanding of the peculiar fad. We came to understand that young people relate to the mutated creatures because every adolescent thinks of himself as a mutated creature. The Turtles are tutored by a sagacious Ninja master, a noble archetypical father figure. That several mutants could join together and use their unique talents and powers to undo the wrongs perpetrated on society by a virulent gang seemed commendable activity for mimicking. Many of the same elements existed in our childhood heroes-The Lone Ranger, Roy Rogers, Lassie and Rin Tin Tin.
It all seemed harmless as a gecko. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles seemed just another Madison Avenue creation designed to sell pizza, Halloween outfits, plastic toys and cassette tapes.
But then we started reading some of the legend which surround the Turtles. For example, one Turtle toy includes a “Portrait of Michelangelo, The wild and crazy Turtle,” which describes him as a “party reptile.”
“Even though the sinister Shredder may be slicing his way through the manhole cover, Mike stays cool,” the “Portrait” explains. “Cool because he’s the master of the whirling nunchuckus. It takes eight pounds of pressure per square inch to break bone. The nunchukus generate ninety! In the midst of the most perilous of battles, Mike can be seen swinging his deadly nunchukus in one hand while dangling a wedge of pizza in the other.”
If the bad guys were really despicable and all other options had been exhausted, Roy Rogers would pull out his trusty six-shooter and nip the desperado in the shoulder or thigh. The Lone Ranger would do the same and even Lassie, when all else failed, would bare her teeth and bite a hardened criminal in the butt. But none of those heroes enjoyed wreaking havoc. Lassie never smiled and barked that her teeth were powerful enough to break wrongdoing bones. Roy Rogers never nonchalantly munched on a hamburger while wielding his deadly weapon.
The message of the Turtles is that casual violence is acceptable, that dispassionate force is justified. The Turtles are to heroes what drive-by shootings are to righteous quests.
So, now that we’re out of the closet, keep your nunchukus-swinging Turtles and give us a spider-chomping gecko. The gecko is more heroic. ~T.Stucky

September 20, 1979

2008-09-11T19:06:00.002-06:00

While the State Fair is a special place for everyone, it is the short people who are most enchanted by it. Their words capture the Fair's appeal most effectively.
"Are we almost to the Fair, Dad? It's sure taking a long time to get there. Why are we parking way out here? My feet are getting tired already. Hey, look, you can see the rides! The first thing we want to do is ride. There are fifteen police cars over there. Why are we walking this way when the rides are that way? Look at that train; there's even a big man driving it. Sure are alot of people here, aren't there, Mom? That's a balloon like I want. I better hold onto your hand, Dad. Hey, look at that huge pumpkin. Can I eat one of those apples? Are we going to go ride now? I can give the man my own tickets. Are you having fun on the merry-go-round, Dad? I want to ride on the motorcycles. Look at me, I'm riding with no hands. What are all those hoses on the ground for? My eardrums are hurting. That's a balloon like I want."
"Yea, let's go look at the horses. These aren't horses. Look at that big bull. I don't think I want to walk down there. What's that smell, Dad? Let's go look at the horses. Hey, look, pigs! It must be their nap time, huh Mom? Can we go see the horses? I petted that goat and he didn't even bite me. Will rabbits bite if you put your fingers in their cage? Look at that rabbits' ears, I bet he trips over them. Are there any horses here? I'm a little thirsty, I think I need a coke. And I need a caramel apple, too. Horses! Horses! Look at that one, isn't it pretty? Look what that one is doing, how disgusting! Can you lift me up to see that one. Can you hold my caramel apple, I don't think I want any more. You probably wouldn't carry me, would you, Dad? That's a balloon just like I want. It sure is a long walk back to the car."
"Thanks for taking us to the Fair. Yea, and thanks for my balloon...." ~T.Stucky

August 10, 1989

2008-08-20T20:33:00.002-06:00

The dog days came in purring rather than snarling, but August can't trick us. It can cuddle up to us with record-breaking cold temperatures, and it can softly lick us with gentle breezes from the north, but we won't be lulled into thinking it's a lap dog.
August is not a month to let into your house, into your good graces, regardless of how cute and docile it pretends to be. Chain the month up outside and use a thick chain, because sooner or later its true nature will appear. Sooner or later August will bare its teeth and maul you.
We've see it happen time after time at the coarse turns of the year. A few balmy days in February and people are ready to forgive the prodigal month its transgressions; just in time to have February open the front door and blow the early Easter greeting cards from the mantel with an icy blast.
So, too, with August. We expect such poor behavior from it that when we get a couple days of decency we trumpet its praises. "We don't need to go to Colorado this year," we say, grinning in the glow of the 60 degree morning. "You just can't beat August in Kansas." Children ride their bikes in the middle of the kindly day. Old folks tend their gardens, unconcerned with the sun.
But, believe us, August is out there, hiding behind a tree, chuckling devilishly, waiting for the chance to attack. And so, even though it is a calm 60 degree morning with no mugginess to be found, we will complain. We will complain as a public service, intent on rustling people from their dog day complacence, intent on vaccinating them with a dose of surliness so they will be able to battle the August infection when it returns.
Atop the list of public service complaints is the front page of the Fall Schedule distributed this wee by Reno County Community College, (sometimes mistakenly referred to as HCC.) The Fall Schedule for this school of higher education sports the motto, "Today's Plans...Tomorrow's Realities." Trite, but no cause for outrage. However, the motto is strategically placed beneath a buxom, blown-dried female student who is making goo-goo eyes with a robust, blown-dried male student who is returning the starry-eyed gaze.
Although the girls is holding a book, it's obvious this couple is not discussing Plato. Is this what higher education has become--a moony-eyed ed and a moon-eyed co-ed exchanging sweet nothings in the shadow of the library? Of all the images of education the college could have used, is this the image which best exemplifies education at Reno County Community College? Is the chance to meet members of the opposite sex the primary attraction of the college?
It may be nice outside now, but August is lurking.
And in August, as in the other traditionally warm months of the year, there are social goons, their car windows down and their power-boost stereo systems cranked up as far as the dial will go. On winter days, when even the socially stunted find it necessary to roll up their car windows, polite society is not assaulted by mega level blasts of doltish decibels. During those blessed months the decibels rage inside the goons' cars, adding to their addlepation.
But with the warmth of spring the windows come down, and the cars come out, and the peaceful streets are rattled with pulsating noise. Their minds numbed by the perpetual onslaught, these villians of summer think everyone in the neighborhood wants to listen to their favorite untunes.
Last week we witnessed a woman walking with a cane on Main Street, her hearing weakened by age, she hesitated and looked skyward as a blaring goon machine approached. She looked toward the heavens as if the apocolypse had begun. When she realized the clamor was from a car radio, she shrugged, knowing evil was yet to have its day.
Stay cranky, people. Be not swayed by August's gentle facade. Don't imagine it to be a month of higher learning and sweet music on the radio. As soon as you settle back in the porch swing with a good book, Brahms playing on your stereo, some starry-eyed son of August will drive by and blast you from your bliss. That's just the nature of August.... ~T.Stucky

August 7, 1980

2008-08-20T20:21:00.002-06:00

Speaking of dreary summers, here we are again ensconced in the doldrums. Harvest is over and the fields wait patiently for rain and a disc. The rodeo, which commands our attention for a few weeks has passed. Vacation days have come and gone quickly, leaving only fond memories and thirty-six color glossy photographs. The first day of school is still three weeks away. The next holiday, a minor one at that, is not until next month. It's hot, it's dry, and it's windy.
It must be August.
August is to the year what rind is to watermelon; something you have to suffer through to get to the good stuff. August is the chaff of the year, the stye in the eye, the pin in the balloon. It's the stumble in your step, the whirl in your pool, the scratch on your record. August is the unwelcome relative who comes to visit every summer, stays too long, and leaves only after annoying you to addlepation. August is the month of exhibition football games showcasing third-string quarterbacks and free-agent linemen. August is like the loathsome bully who blocks your path, forcing you to take the long way home. It's just not a friendly month.
It's the kind of month Dante, O'Neill, or St. Paul would write about. A troublesome time, not really deadly, merely torturous. Thirty-one days, says the calendar. Three hundred and one days says the spirit, wilted by the heat, parched by the drought, and burdened by the boredom.
John Keats doubtless had August in mind when he penned, "O aching time! O moments big as years."
It is a month of moments big as years, and the years are no the kind you fondly remember. As we plod through the seemingly interminable month of August we do so with one sustaining hope-- September.... ~T.Stucky

August 31, 1978

2008-08-20T20:12:00.003-06:00

A large spider, exhibiting all the attributes which we humans strive for, has taken up residence outside our north window in Varner. Her (How to tell a her from a he?) intelligence is beyond question. She spins her web across the window every evening so that when the lights in the house attract bugs she has a ready food supply.
Her artistic ability would embarrass Picasso. Not only does she create a beautiful and functional piece of art, she also creates her own medium.
Kindness, that most human of characteristics, is also displayed by this unlikely creature. When a moth which is too small to make a nourishing snack gets captured in her web, she will free it.
Showing astounding perserverance, she quickly repairs holes in her web, torn by the wind. Time after time she repairs with no sign of irritation or anger.
The single attribute she lacks is an attractive appearance. She has eight legs, and a large round body topped by two bulbous eyes. Certainly not the stuff of good dreams.
Looks aside, she is a creature that should be appreciated, even emulated. Yet, when we see one of her kin in the house we quickly put it out of our misery.
At the same time, we feed a cute dog expensive food, fondle it daily, and make certain it has all its life-continuing shots. For what reason? The dog is neither artistic nor intelligent. Its kindness consists of slobbering on anyone's hand.
Yesterday, after giving the dog a mound of vittles, we noticed the spider looking reproachfully down at us. We were so embarrassed we wrote this column.... ~T.Stucky

August 2, 1991

2008-08-01T15:25:00.001-06:00

Our neighbors were particularly rowdy Saturday evening. Blame it on the weather; a cool breeze pushed the soft clouds across the blue sky, making it feel more like October than late July. It was a perfect evening to be raucous.
Sitting on the back steps watching the day end, observing a spider perform a death-defying bungee trick, leaping from the corner of the house with no more than a thin strand of web to prevent him or her from crashing into the pebbles far below, the calm evening was shattered when our blue jay neighbors started bickering.
At the top of the maple tree the father blue jay said something the mother didn’t care to hear. She let him know in no uncertain terms, her complaints beginning low and guttural and ending with screams. Chastened, he responded with screams of his own. Back and forth they yelled, until one of their offspring, now old enough to be off on his own (perhaps the source of the squabble) few near his mother and begged for an after-dinner snack.
Dutifully, the mother flew off in search of something edible, leaving the father to squawk beneath his bird breath.
Focus shifts to the bare branches atop an elm tree where two Mississippi kites call for “Ce-cile, Ce-cile.” A pack of starlings, having dropped graffiti on the sidewalk, swarm around the majestic kites, like a ghetto gang around uptown celebrities. The kites, still whistling for “Ce-cile,” soar easily above the tree until the starling gang loses interest in harassment and flies off in search of other delinquencies.
Our neighborhood kites are so gracious in flight and manner that we wonder if they are behavioral mutants. Kindred of our kites have been known to dive bomb small children innocently playing and little old ladies peacefully tending their gardens. We have long hoped a kite would attack us as we pushed the lawnmower around the yard, giving us justification for ceasing such mindless activity. But our neighborhood kites simply soar and whistle for “Ce-cile,” as passive as butterflies.
As the kites lift skyward they avoid the chattering chimney swifts which dart and dash across the sky, gulping winged insects. Looking like cigar stubs with sings, the swifts regularly race into the chimney to feed their young, who wait open-mouthed in mud nests. High-pitched twittering billows from the chimney as the young greet their parents.
A red-headed woodpecker swoops into the honey locust tree and begins hammering on a dead limb. Woodpecker skulls have thick walls and woodpecker brains have a tough outer membrane, preventing addlepation when the feathered jackhammers knock their way through bark and wood in search of grubs. But one wonders about the genetic transfer of intelligence from generation to generation.
On the lawn, a robin takes advantage of the recent rain, hopping from worm to worm, hesitating between gulps to cock his head and search for cats. When a treeful of sparrows holding a cacophonous convention down the alley suddenly hushes, the robin senses a predator. Sure enough, our cat, whose reputation as a blood-thirsty marauder must be well-known to the feathered community, sneaks around the corner of the garage with both eyes on the robin. Forewarned by the silenced sparrows, the robin pulls a final worm from the soft soil as he flits to the safety of the pecan tree.
The father blue jay, still agitated by his matrimonial spat, sees the cat and vents his spleen on the feline, squawking as if the cat were his wife. The cat nonchalantly strides to the porch, stretches and yawns, then lays down with closed eyes.
Atop the elm tree, two western kingbirds are now heckling the kites, periodically flying at the larger birds as if they mean business. .The kites, like the cat, confidently ignore the insults.
A pare of wrens, filled with the joy of the evening, sing to each other as they hurry to and form their tiny house.
As dusk darkens, the wrens stay home, the kites perch in peace, and the kingbirds and starling are finally still. The night is left to the cicadas and crickets.
With the sun just a faint grey smudge on the western sky, we stretch and yawn and go into our home to lay down with closed eyes. ~T.Stucky

July 20, 1989

2008-07-14T13:11:00.000-06:00

Desperately seeking an attitude transplant but finding no donors with attitudes our psyche would not reject, we reconcile ourselves to the Dog Days.
The ancient Greeks celebrated the season by collaring all the loose dogs in the vicinity and roasting them on a communal bonfire.
We prefer slumbering. The heat, the humidity, the lack of late summer excitement are perfect ingredients for a healthy batch of sleep.
The average person in this country lives about 75 years. That same common person spends fully 25 years asleep; fully one third of the only life we have is spent with eyes and mind closed, oblivious.
Except in late summer, that seems a ridiculous waste of time. But with the thermometer at 98 degrees, the humidity at 95%, and Pete Rose 90% sure of being ousted from baseball, sleeping seems like the ideal pastime.
Some suggest life would be richer without sleep, that noble accomplishments would be common if only we were constantly conscious. Wisdom would be attained, experiences would be encountered, hopes would be realized, bills would be paid if only we didn’t while away a third of our lives in somnolence.
It seems improper, they argue, that we who teeter at the very peak of evolutionary advance should be cursed with slumber needs. Plants don’t sleep. Some animals never doze off. Why, even the lowly amoeba performs its mindless functions 24 hours a day. “Good night, don’t let the virus bite,” is not part of amoebic vernacular.
Children share the sentiments of the sleep-haters. Short people, not yet imparted with adult wisdom, think of sleep as an abomination, a vexation of the spirit. Left to their own devices, youngsters would put an end to sleep.
Scientists describe sleep as a normal condition of the body “characterized by a depression of the physiological activities with a degree of unconsciousness.” The same white-robed biological apostles have used their waking hours to determine that sleep is essential for the reconstruction of human organs after a period of activity-only in the absence of such activity can reconstruction take place. Hence, according to scientific manuals (manuals embraced by many politicians), if we wish to be conscious we must first be unconscious. With apologies to Descartes, I sleep therefore I am.
Extensive study has attempted to decipher the mechanics of sleep. One theory contends sleep results from an accumulation of acid products during the active hours which causes a numbing of the central nervous system. Another theory proposes that the body used more intramolecular oxygen during the waking hours which finally diminishes the body’s sensitivity.
We grow sleepy reading about why we are growing sleepy.
Thomas Alva Edison, the idol of every red-blooded America school boy, lived 84 years and held patents on 1,033 different inventions. During his days on earth, Edison spent little time in bed. Child-like in his enthusiasm for the world around him, in order to experience as much of is as possible he perfected the five-minute doze. While working on the light bulb he experimented unsuccessfully with thousands of filaments. During his experiments he seldom spent a night in bed, preferring momentary naps.
On the other end of the sleep scale are poets. Shakespeare recognized the essential nature of blissful rest; “We are such stuff as dreams are made of, and our little life is rounded with a sleep.”
Samuel Coleridge thoroughly appreciated the pleasure of a pillow beneath his head; “Oh! Sleep it is a gentle thing beloved from pole to pole.”
These Dog Days it is Shakespeare rather than Edison who should be emulated.
The primary accomplishment of Edison was the creation of artificial light which gets in our eyes when we try to sleep.
So, flip that switch on your way out. And don’t bother us until September…. ~T.Stucky

July 5, 1990

2008-07-10T16:22:00.001-06:00

Wednesday's paper carried the story of a Louisiana man who was apparently electrocuted when his sweat dripped into the electric drill he was using to build a swing set in his back yard. In the oppressive summer heat, his attempt at constructive activity met with a tragic consequence.
Imagine that; life shocked away while engaged in the noblest of pursuits-creating a plaything for a grandchild.
Now, the man could be immortalized as the patron saint of playground equipment, or he could be used by the makers of power tools as an example of what happens when you don’t read the instruction manual. He may become an icon used by couch potatoes across the land to justify their vegetative existence, or he may become known to history (after his fifteen minutes of breakfast table fame have elapsed) as just another unfortunate soul with overactive sweat glands.
We read the article with interest because we were preparing to defy the heat and slap some paint on the house. We took particular note of the article because the portion of the house to be painted includes the electricity meter and the shiny metal power line.
Electricity to us, two centuries after Franklin and a century after Edison, remains a mysterious phenomenon, something not understandable-somewhat like rap music. We flip on the television and see the image, we turn on the radio and hear the sound, we press the button on the microwave and get hot pizza, but don’t ask us how. We know not to dry our hair while still in the bathtub. We know not to unclog the toaster with a fork, and we know cats should not be encouraged to lick electricity outlets. But we don’t know why something so kind and beneficial (we quickly go crazy during power outages) could be malevolent to the point of killing a perspiring man building a swing set in his back yard.
Our first awareness of electricity’s split personality came on a tranquil summer day during our tranquil childhood. Bill Serkland, the kid down the street who knew everything because he had an older brother, was tossing a ball around in the yard. By accident or design, the ball landed on the roof and we were forced to pile a chair atop the picnic table and climb to the roof to retrieve it.
Because the roof was a place to which we seldom ventured, we made the most of our visit, checking out the shuffle board equipment stored under the eaves, looking down into the neighbors’ yard from our hilltop vantage point, waving with dominion at the kids far below playing in the sprinkler. And then we approached the power wires and telephone line which served as an umbilical cord, connecting our house to the electric mother power poles which loomed in the alley. Three black-wrapped power lines swept down from the pole, and one thin telephone line.
“You can touch one of these power lines at a time,” Bill Serkland said. “But you touch two at a time, you’re dead.”
Parental warning had long since made us wary of the wires, and so when we saw Bill stroll nonchalantly over and grab a wire we half-expected to see him snapped rigid, then fried to a crisp black by the surge of electricity. But he held the line like it was a long piece of licorice, grinning a wise grin.
Then he eased over to the telephone line. “You can grab this one, too. But just make sure nobody calls while you’ve got a hold of it. A call comes over the line when you’re touching it, you’re dead.”
He hesitated long enough to draw in a deep breath, then grabbed the line tightly for a bold moment before, alive and triumphant, letting loose.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Grab ahold. Your mom’s probably not expecting any calls.”
There we were, atop the house on what had been a tranquil day, having our courage questioned. “My sister gets a lot of calls during the day.” A feeble offering. The corner of Bill Serkland’s mouth went up as the corner of his skeptical eye came down. Our bluff had been called.
And so, thinking that life had been sweet, and hoping that fate would still the dialing finger of any would-be caller, we sidled over to the telephone line and reached out and touched it. No call, no power surge, no death.
As we jumped down from the roof, having tempted fate, having looked death in the eye and barely blinked, we realized just how sweet life was, how exhilarating, how thrilling.
We hope the Louisiana man came to that same realization before his call came…. ~T.Stucky

July 9, 1987

2008-07-02T08:21:00.003-06:00

Music stores these days are brimming with the sounds of nature. One of the latest rages for the ears is the refreshing sound of the tide lapping rhythmically upon the sandy shore, the gentle sound of a summer breeze stirring the aspen leaves, the discordant croaks, chirps and splashes of a cat-tailed pond.
A host of record companies have recorded outdoor sounds, pressed them into long-play records, and are selling them for $10 per. From smog-laden Los Angeles to thug-laden New York, people are relaxing after a long day battling the metropolis by pulling earphones down over their heads and escaping into the country. Recently, video cassettes which combine the sounds of nature with the scenes of nature have been selling like pornography.
Listening to a waterfall on the stereo or watching the sun rise over a field of sunflowers on the television is, they claim, better than being there.
We don’t have an album of nature’s noises, nor do we have a video of idyllic country visions. But we did sit on the front porch steps one evening last week, after the sun had gone home for the night, as the robust sounds of the day were being softened by twilight. A dog near and a dog far clamored against some unseen foe. The last of the cicadas was winding down as the crickets were tuning up.
As darkness lowered its ceiling acoustics improved, sounds magnified. Four heels scraped the asphalt of an adjoining street, giving distinct rhythm to the voices of two boys making their hurried way toward some engagement. Another youngster sped past on his bike, the tires whirring, kicking up an uneven tail of gravel.
For a time activity ceased. Crickets created their cacophony. From a field south of town came the low of a mother cow beckoning her calf. From the living room windows of several homes oozed the soft, humming blue of television and through the screen doors of those homes came the commercial laughter of summer reruns.
Then down the street, slowly, came the stooped figure of an old man. Garrison Keillor says old people walk slowly through small towns because they know the stories of each house and as they trudge past each abode they struggle to remember the story. This man must have known the stories and must have had trouble recollecting them because he would take a few steps then stop, then a few more steps and hesitate again. If the people watching their glowing boxes would have glimpsed out their windows they might have thought he was peeping in from the darkness of the street.
But he wasn’t. What was going on in the houses didn’t seem to concern him. He would just glance at a house and then return his gaze to his shuffling feet. At the corner he turned and went on, moving steadily in and out of streetlight glows.
Spinning car tires screamed from Main Street and another car honked, breaking the stillness. High school voices echoes off asphalt and frame houses. Above, a nighthawk’s wings slapped through the dark.
There was no waterfall, no comforting splash of tide against shoreline, but the natural small town sounds were reassuring. They are not sounds which would delight the ear through stereo headphones, and a video of an old man shuffling down a darkened street is not the stuff Oscars are made of.
But they are the timeless sights and sounds which make it unnecessary for us to purchase a $10 recording of tranquility….

June 18, 1981

2008-06-25T13:08:00.002-06:00

Fathers are rarely remembered for what they really are. Rather, youthful memories of ol' dad are an amalgam of nuances, of seemingly insignificant traits, of personal habits. Being a generation apart while simultaneously being so physically close, makes it impossible for children to clearly see fathers. Expectations, hopes, and demands cloud vision.
My father impaled himself on my memory when I was a lad not by being the able breadwinner, the concerned parent, nor the sagacious elder. Instead, he was the shirtless guy who mowed the yard, the band of his undershorts protruding from his jeans, making a gleaming white ring about his midriff. He'd get to the end of the first pass across the lawn and, while turning the mower around, he'd grab the back of his jeans and pull them up. The band disappeared. But after a few steps his pants would begin to inch down and there it was again, that elastic ring, easing out like the first rays of dawn.
My father will always be the man who displayed his underwear waistband to the neighborhood every Saturday afternoon.
He will also live forever in my mind as the man who piled his green beans, mashed potatoes, corn and roast beef into one vast mound before forking it into his mouth. We siblings would exchange slow looks of repulsion, our eyes narrowing, our upper lips rising in disgust. Between mouthfuls he spoke words which to this day ring clearly in my ears, "It all goes to the same place." With such logic we could not argue.
My father is the guy who used his middle finger for discipline. The side of my head is a lumpy tribute to the strength of his stout digit. He was not one for spanking, he merely confined his bent middle finger with his thumb, holding it there like a set mouse trap, before loosing it smack against my crew-cut head. The thump of discipline continues to reverb.
Dad was also the guy who pinned my arms above my head on Sunday morning before he shaved, and scraped his course stubble chin on my stomach, making me crazy with laughter. It tickled and it hurt at the same time. It was wonderful. And he always knew when I had had enough.
I do not know my father as a businessman, or an official in the church. It never dawned on me that he worried about paying bills, that he had personal failings as well as successes. He was not a man with definite opinions about politics, or morality, or social change.
To me he was the blue-eyed, slightly balding man with the white elastic waistband, who ate his beans with his mashed potatoes, and alternately tickled me and thumped me.
His effect on me is only now becoming apparent. Last weekend as I walked the yard shirtless behind the lawnmower, I found myself periodically hitching up my pants. It struck me there was a white band showing.
For dinner my beans were piled close to the mashed potatoes. As I scooped them up together, there was a collective gasp of revulsion from the short people, their faces contorted in disgust. I couldn't help myself, the words simply fell out, "It all goes to the same place." Aaron smirked. I reached over and thumped him with my middle finger.
To all those fathers, they who deserve more credit than we ever give them, we wish Sunday to be a worthy day.... ~T.Stucky

June 4, 1987

2008-06-20T20:29:00.002-06:00

Scientists, theologians, and poets have struggled for centuries for an understanding of life. Moralist ponder life's beginning and its end. We guard against aborting life almost as vigorously as we guard against euthanasia.
Life is sacred, something to be preserved, and yet it remains a mystery. Scientists explain it in terms of amino acids and electric charges. Theologians discuss its worth in terms of destiny.
Poets are neither so basic nor so eternal. Robert Browning wrote,"I count life just a stuff to try the soul's strength on..." Keats called human life, "the war, the deeds, the disappointments, the anxiety, imagination's struggles, far and nigh..."
But poetic phrases don't explain life -- life defies grand exaltations. When the pretense, scientific verbiage, theological summations, and poetry is striped away what remains is a steady stream of insignificant events. Taken together, these easily forgotten experiences form life.
Life is trying to remember the last time you changed the oil in the car. It is telling a joke and forgetting the punch line. Life is a wedding band that has cut off the circulation in your ring finger.
Life is a lawnmower that won't start, a fight that will, and a payment plan that won't end. It is a bruised fingernail, a weak knee, a tennis elbow. It is tripping on the family dog and spending a week in the hospital recuperating. Life is placing a wreath of flowers on the grave of a grandmother.
Major events give life ambition, but the trivial give it texture and definition.
Life is defined by carsickness on a vacation, a scar on the foot, a new shirt on the first day of school, a solid hit at the baseball game. Life is scoring a long touchdown and having it called back for a penalty, having a home run curve foul, missing a shot at the buzzer.
Life is sitting on the bench thinking about getting into the game. It is the bad-hop grounder that chips your tooth. It's the pain in your lower back when your playing days are over.
Life is hail and snowdrifts and lightning flashes and being forced into the basement by the wind. It is mornings in coats and long johns and it is shirtless afternoons. It is watching a thundercloud billow over a ripe wheat field. Life is finding out your camping tent is not waterproof.
Life is finding that special person who laughs at your wit even when you're not funny. It is sitting up late at night with sick children. It is a kiss before supper. Life is making mistakes and feeling so sorry your bones ache.
We are all so busy with the process of living we sometimes fail to recognize life.
Life is wondering how you would look with a different hairstyle. It is longing for the days when you had hair. It is standing in front of a mirror gazing at your own reflection. Life is wondering whose life it is you are leading.
Life is a difficult, glorious enterprise, which brings bruises and bliss. Thomas Hobbs called it "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short." But perhaps it's just solitary enough to make us appreciate a friend, just nasty and brutish enough to make us enjoy the tranquil evening, just short enough to make us delight in the time we have.... ~T.Stucky

June 8, 1989

2008-06-09T10:37:00.002-06:00

Sunday evening, during a brief interlude in the deluge, the dog took us for a walk. Streams of runoff bubbled in the gutters, mirror puddles reflecting the neighborhood, full oaks and maples shook themselves int he north breeze, sending off a cool spray. In the distance, thunder complained about its workload.
After months of dry, of parched winds sweeping topsoil from exposed fields, of listening to arid predictions the Midwest was on the verge of becoming the Great American Desert again, it was a delightfully soggy day. But, being Midwesterners, we couldn't express our damp joy by giving in to our urges and splashing like Gene Kelley in the brimming gutters. (Garrison Keillor said, "here in the Midwest, having a good time is considered okay provided you don't let it happen again.")
That Kansans have long been cultivating their stodginess is confirmed by a Dr. Karl Menninger observation printed in 1939. Whether his conclusion was the result of witnessing a couple and their dog repressing their desire to gambol in the rain, or whether it resulted from a friend's failure to chuckle at one of the good doctor's jokes is lost to history, but sixty years ago Dr. Menninger wrote, "Kansans have gone off the deep end with desperate seriousness, and in so doing earned for themselves the name of being humorless, puritanical people, incapable of joy and grudging in their attitudes toward those happier than themselves. This is not a pretty reputation and naturally one shrinks from accepting this description of oneself and his friends and neighbors. Oddly enough, however, we do accept it almost unanimously and meekly endure the opprobrium and ridicule of other states. This I believe to be due to a humility of self-distrust so great as to be crippling to our energies."
"Humorless"? "Incapable of joy"? "Begrudging the happy"?
Well, we may be a trifle listless, but that's because we labor so valiantly. We may be somewhat lackluster, but that's because we recognize the shallowness of luster. We may be prosaic, but that's because we recognize the limitations of poetry.
But to suggest we have no sense of humor and are unable to muster a sense of joy makes us...well, sad. Certainly such sweeping claims are nothing to laugh about. There's nothing in our genes which prevents us from having a sunny disposition. Nothing in our makeup which precludes chortling, giggling, or even loosing a horsey guffaw. We're having as good a time as folks in any other region of the country, we have simply refined the ability to have a good time without making a show of it.
On the west coast or the east coast you can witness people having a grand time everywhere you go. At the beach they laugh loudly. In bars they hug and slap each other on the back. At parties they carelessly cavort as if they'd never had so much fun.
We Midwesterners know an insincere display when we see one. These people are not having a good time, they're not humorous, they're not happy. They're just good actors, playing a role, pretending they're bit players in a beer commercial.
We Midwesterners know that when you're truly happy nobody knows it but you; that the best way to express bliss is to act as though it's just another day at the office. In so doing, we don't make those around us who are not having a great day feel worse. We Midwesterners are considerate with our joy.
So walking back to the house, filled with the glory of the day, we held our dog, and our emotions on a leash, not wanting the neighbors to feel bad - because we felt so good. ~T.Stucky

May 29, 1980

2008-05-27T12:56:00.002-06:00

The morning was bright and already uncomfortably warm. Puffs of cottonwood white hung lightly in the still, humid air. We pulled over to the edge of the dusty road and stopped the car.
"Why are we stopping here?" asked the short person.
"I need a picture of a cemetery."
"Why?" she asked climbing from the front seat.
I walked ahead and didn't answer.
"Why do you need a picture here?"
"It's Memorial Day," I said, focusing on a crumbled gravestone, its markings almost smooth from the sanding of one hundred Kansas summers.
"Who put the flowers there?"
The shutter clicked and we started back for the car. Birds in the trees surrounding the cemetery were disrespectfully noisy. "People come on Memorial Day to honor people they knew who have died."
"Why do they bring flowers?"
"It's a sign that someone still remembers. I suppose people bring flowers because they add some color and life. It wouldn't really pay to bring a steak sandwich, would it?" Me feeble attempt at levity brought no response. "You'll bring flowers to my grave, won't you?"
Ignoring my words she looked across the yard, studded with grey monuments and now sprinkled with brilliant spring flowers, and said, "It does look pretty, but I don't think they care." I took it she meant the cemetery's inhabitants.
"You're probably right."
We got into the car and headed north toward other duties. The cemetery was forgotten. Or at least I thought it was.
Well down the road she turned and said, "I think I'll bring you a steak sandwich Dad."
We both smiled.... ~T.Stucky

May 21, 1981

2008-05-27T12:48:00.002-06:00

You are only a few hours old--your eyes don't see, your ears hear little, your mouth makes only the most basic sounds. Yet, some things need to be explained to you.
If you were able to reason and speak, you would be excused for asking why it was you were brought here. As you took your first breath, men were starving themselves to death in Northern Ireland, children were starving to death in Asia and Africa, and people were starved for attention the world over. Why would people allow this to happen? Well, that's just the way we do things in this world.
As the doctor was checking your vital signs, the Pope lay near death in a Rome hospital, the victim of a gunshot wound. Our own President is still not fully recovered from the attack on his life. Why are we so intent on snuffing out life, the very thing which you are fighting so hard to maintain? Well, that's just the way we do things here. Someday, maybe you will understand.
We have recently changed the course of our nation. (That's right. You are officially a citizen of the United States.) We have decided to reduce funding of school lunches at the same time we escalate our military budget. That was we can produce even more sophisticated implements of destruction. In fact, only a few miles from where you were pulled into this world, an atomic missile is poised beneath the ground, pointed toward our communist enemies. Yes, there are babies in that country too. But that's the way we do things here.
Is this any place to bring a baby?
Well, maybe not. And yet maybe it's because things are not perfect that we need you. Because you hate no one, because you are dumb to the distinction between communist and capitalist, because a Catholic looks the same as a Protestant, and a Black the same as an Oriental, you are an example of what we yearn to be. You are free of malice, greed, discrimination, and hate. You are the perfection we all so eagerly seek.
You give us hope. In return, we wish you a long and peaceful life.
Welcome to our flawed world, Carly. It is already nicer for your being in it.... ~T.Stucky

May 14, 1987

2008-05-03T15:01:00.003-06:00

"Would you please let me read this book to you?" she asked, her teeth freshly brushed, her pillow fluffed, good-night kisses properly distributed.
"It's Tuesday night," we said. (Tuesday night equates to a black hole for weekly newspaper people-typing final articles, laying out pages and writing headlines won't permit the escape of attention to familial duties.)
"But I'll read it fast," she said. Being the shortest of the short people who lives with us, she can be particularly persuasive. "And this is a good book."
She lifted the ragged book from beneath the sheet. Its binding had long ago been doctored with masking tape. The cover was fading, ink was worn from the picture. This book had been read hundreds of times-hundreds of times to each of the three short people who preceded the one who held it aloft now.
"Whistle for Willie" by Ezra Jack Keats, the escapades of a youngster who, after failing several times, learns how to whistle for his dog, was Allison' favorite when she was barely old enough to sit and listen. The opening line, "Oh how Peter wished he could whistle!" was the first piece of literature she committed to memory.
That, unbelievably, was twelve years ago. Those distant days are now just pictures in the photo album. The sounds, the smells, the feel of squeezes from tiny hands are no more. So quickly they have gone.
She, who as an infant empathized with Peter in his diligent attempt to whistle for his dog, is now intent on learning how to ease the clutch out while softly pressing the accelerator. She's learning how to downshift and signal for a turn. She's learning that you can't be as cautious as your parents want you to be and still drive a car.
The ancient Greeks would appreciate what we are going through. When their teenage offspring wanted to take the family chariot out for a spin, they'd gather around the fire and tell the tale of Phaethon, son of Helios, who pleaded to experience the thrill of driving the sun's chariot across the heavens. Given the chance, he drove recklessly and almost set the world on fire before being struck down by a bolt of Zeus's lightning.
Icarus, you may remember from Greek mythology class, suffered an equally unkind fate. The son of Daedalus, he flew from his homeland on wings formed by his father. But when he soared too high, the sun's heat melted the wax holding the wings together and he fell into the sea.
Parents are willing to use myth to keep children children, to keep them home, safe, sheltered from the evil out there. But we know it doesn't work. Like Phaethon, they naturally have the urge to break free, to streak across the sky. Today they are toddlers, tomorrow they get their first bicycle, and by Friday they are off to college.
An elderly woman, haunted by the memories of the glory days when her young children would all gather around the dinner table to eat and tell the events of the day, removes the many pictures of her children and grandchildren from the mantel. A young parent yanks a child's arm and berates him in public for doing what children do. If only the elderly woman could talk to the parent.
Seldom do we fully appreciate the moment. There seem to be so many more waiting. We can waste a few here, a few more there. We can go without saying the things we know we should say. We can go another day without doing what we know we should be doing. We can get caught in the race for advance, scrambling priorities, because we have time to make it right.
But then, too quickly, the days are gone.
"I'll read fast," she said. "'Oh how Peter wished he could whistle!'".... ~T.Stucky

April 30, 1981

2008-04-18T19:43:00.003-06:00

It was to be an important learning experience - one of those lessons parents feel compelled to present to their children. What better way to illustrate life, death, cohabitation, and the responsibility than to raise a flock of pigeons?
The plans for the coop were sketched and the materials purchased. Nails were nailed, screws were screwed, and wire fence was attached, turning a mass of lumber into a pigeon haven. The excitement was building in the short people. Lessons were being learned.
When two silver birds, a male and a female, were released into the coop they seemed to enjoy their new environs. The male spent most of his time sitting idly near the nesting box while his mate diligently surveyed their new home, flying repeatedly from the roosting bar to the floor and back.
Having raised pigeons when we were short, we were able to wow the youngsters with our knowledge of the new winged pets. With appropriate vagueness we explained how the two would pair off, how they would work together to prepare the nest, how they would make themselves ready for parenthood.
With wide eyes the short people listened, obviously impressed with our pigeon proficiency. Their awe prompted us to further explanation. Pointing to the male, still sitting heavily near the nesting box, we informed the youngsters of how the cock assists in egg incubation. From the time the hen lays the first egg, she will sit on the nest from four in the afternoon until ten in the morning. During the late morning and early afternoon the male dutifully warms his future children. And when the eggs hatch in eighteen days, (The more specifics we tossed in the more the young eyes and mouths widened.) both parents will supply the squabs with a milky nourishment secreted from their crop glands.
It won't take long now for that lean female to deposit two eggs in the nesting box straw. The short people were excited. They demanded more details which we skillfully supplied.
It was wonderful. The project was even a better object lesson than we had planned. Not only were life, death, birth, and cooperation to be vividly exhibited, but the short ones were also gaining new respect for their parents. It was everything we had hoped for and more.
And then the "male" proudly laid two eggs. End of lesson.... ~T. Stucky

April 26, 1996

2008-04-13T09:16:00.003-06:00

I wish I could remember where I put the article. It was so encouraging. It made me feel my growing anxiety was unjustified. It convinced me my memory loss was nothing out of the ordinary, nothing to be overly concerned about.

I just wish I could remember where I put the article.

I remember cutting it out after reading it, thinking it was a source I could refer to later--during those times when one of the people I live with says, "Remember, I told you I was going to Hutch this afternoon." or "Yes, you've been told that shirt does not go with those pants."

I remember thinking that when those situations arose I could pull the article from its safe place and say something like, "The reason I don't remember is that I have so many other important things on my mind." (I think that's what the article said.)

The article referred to a recently published book by some doctor who has counseled many of the Baby Boomer Generation who are finding their minds aren't as clear as they once were. They forget appointments, they forget anniversaries, they forget what it was they were saying in the middle of a sentence, they forget...well...they forget other things, too. The good doctor, the article noted, gives his clients solace, saying memory lapses are natural; they are not an indication that brain cells are dying, they are not an indication Baby Boomers are a stumble away from the rocking chair in the corner.

At least, I think that's what the article said.

Chatting with acquaintances Sunday afternoon, I recognized the dull gaze which flows from the eyes when people have heard the story before. And I realized that what I thought was fresh and sparkling and captivating, was none of the above because it was a twice-told tale. The punch line, like a George Foreman uppercut, was aged and ineffective.

Seeing that blank stare midway through my monologue, made me want to pull out that article and confirm to my listeners that I wasn't losing my mind, that my reasoning ability was still intact, that the gray matter was still functional. I wanted to let them know that scientific research indicates sometimes the brain recalls that first bite of cherry cheese cake which delighted the mouth back in first grade more readily than what was munched for breakfast this morning.

I think the article also mentioned that there are ways to enhance memory. It listed a couple of things that can be done to avoid those embarrassing exchanges between significant others--"No, you never told me I wasn't supposed to bet our savings account that the Chiefs would win the Super Bowl." "I don't thing you ever said the Rottweilers were my responsibility." "You mean we don't have an upstairs bathroom?"

According to the article, there are numerous books written by people whose names I can't remember, which provide clever tricks to help people remember names. When introduced to a woman named Lucy, for example, the name can be permanently logged by noting that her voice sounds like a goose. When you see her again and she says hello, her nasally voice will trigger the association "Goosey...Lucy." If she doesn't speak first, there may be a problem. There may also be a problem if your memory serves you "ducky" or "adenoid" instead of goosey.

Several years ago, a former basketball player, I can't for the life of me remember who it was, published a book about memory tricks. He appeared on a talk show reeling off a lengthy list of words and numbers which he had memorized in sequence in a matter of seconds. It was a stunning display of how the human mind can be focused to store insignificant data for later use.

It almost seems like I bought that book. I think it's lying around here somewhere. ~T.Stucky

April 29, 1982

2008-04-10T17:07:00.003-06:00

It was a momentous occasion-an occasion which carried as much dread as joy. After several years of being satisfied with a plastic baseball bat, the short people began clamoring for a metal bat. So last Saturday, with a good deal of trepidation, a shiny, hard, aluminum bat replaced the safe plastic one in the backyard.

The short people were enthusiastic, even as they received strict instructions on the importance of cautious swinging. For the big people, visions of a youngster with a split head palled the opening of the new season.

As a result it came as no great surprise when Emily came dashing into the house Monday afternoon saying, "He hit her on the head with the bat!" Emily was obviously safe, Carly was sleeping upstairs, so by process of elimination Allison must be lying unconscious in the grass.

Not so. There at the back door, hand pressed tight against a forehead that was rapidly swelling and changing color, was ol' n. She had been helping Aaron search for the baseball under a bush when he lifted the bat and her head happened to be in the way.

There were the usual comments. "It was a home run, huh, Mom." "Do you see stars?" "Did you think you were a baseball?" "You look like a unicorn." "You're the season's first casualty."

However, the humor in the event took a while to appear. It came slowly, at about the same speed the bump disappeared.... ~T.Stucky

April 9, 1987

2008-04-05T09:57:00.002-06:00

Tuesday morning two plump robins hopped around in our backyard harassing a young female goldfinch. The goldfinch, having just flown in from its winter home in the deep south, was content to peck away at the apparently tasty morsels which the yard offered. The robins, exercising their territorial imperative, were intent on routing the lone intruder.

Working as a team, the two robins, their heads up, their knees stiff, bounced in tandem toward the goldfinch. The small bird looked at the threatening pair as if wondering why they who had too much would deny her a little. By scurrying between brief feedings she was able to maintain a safe distance.

We wondered, too, why this robust couple would bully their weaker cousin. She was not after their worms. Why heckle the little matron? As we watched our image of the kindly robin which graces Easter paintings, which serves as a harbinger of spring, which we embrace as our most beloved feathered friend began to fade. These spindly legged characters are the muggers of the backyard.

And then we realized what the goldfinch was feasting on. In our never-ending effort to annihilate chickweed and dandelions and promote a lush growth of grass we had spread granules of fertilizer and poison on the lawn. The goldfinch appeared to be munching on the toxic berries - berries that resemble the seeds she is accustomed to eating.

And so, in the eternal drama being staged out our kitchen window, we became the villains, the robins (falsely accused of assault and battery) became saintly protectors, attempting to keep the tender goldfinch from the poison, and the goldfinch remained the doomed femme.

The problem with all the world being a stage is that you never know what your part is.... ~T.Stucky

April 2, 1987

2008-04-01T20:02:00.001-06:00

This is, for those of you who come to this corner seeking chronological bearings, "The Year of the Reader," so declared by the Library of Congress.

The intent of the special designation, which overlaps with The Year of the Golden Plover and The Decade of Uncommon Social Persuasion, is to make reading more accessible to Americans of all ages. President Reagan hopes the effort will "restore reading to a place of preeminence in our personal lives and in the life of our nation."

An estimated 27 million people in this country are functionally illiterate, which means they cannot read at a fifth grade level. When you toss in the millions of pre-schoolers and primary grade students the number of functionally illiterate mushroom dramatically.

Now the reading bandwagon has been loosed from the garage and sent rumbling across the continent, hordes are stampeding to get on board. For instance, K-Mart, where America goes to shop, is recognizing the special year by putting up signs, handing out bookmark bag stuffers and encouraging their employees to serve as literary tutors to their communities.

Develop a mental picture of the clerk who zipped your items across the bar-marking reader the last time you visited the big city bustle - and - hustle mart. Is this someone you want coming into your home with a reading list?

Think about the stock boy piling toilet paper into a tottering mound in aisle 32. Is this a guy you want reading stories to you functionally illiterate?

This is how serious we are about wiping out illiteracy. We're prepared to arm our stock boys with an arsenal of Barbara Cartland and send them off to conquer the world for readership. Restoring preeminence, indeed.

In fact, despite Steven Spielberg's comments at Monday night's Academy Award program, reading is a relic of the past, booted into antiquity by motion pictures and television. Lifting the Titanic from the ocean floor would be kid's play compared to raising reading to its former preeminence. And both are better left lying right where they are.

Back in the old days when people read, when the printed word was the basis for communal thought, people were too analytical, they delved too far below the surface, they too often read between the lines. In those days they created their own images of life at seas, of flight in a balloon, of the horror of slavery. And because they created their own images, those images became real, influencing society from the grassroots up.

When reading was preeminent, people gathered on street corners and in meeting halls to debate religion, politics, social developments. It was a disruptive time. People had opinions and they could back them up with words printed in black ink on white paper.

Back then politicians used the printed word to convey their beliefs. Voters knew where their elected officials stood, and they held them accountable. Wavering on issues was difficult when words were recorded with black ink on white paper.

Today we seldom see the written words of a president. We see his smile, his full head of hair, his crisp wave on the evening news. It come and it goes. Little accountability for mistakes. Few solid opinions. A handsome face replacing a contemplative mind as the only qualification for high office.

Is it any wonder then, that in "The Year of the Reader" we are enlisting stock boys to raise our country's literacy rate.... ~T. Stucky

March 27, 1980

2008-03-26T07:41:00.002-06:00

The troublesome thing about turning 30 is contending with the compulsion to assess the years gone by. If it was possible to just become 30 without analyzing your life to that point, it would be far less painful. But like a milestone midway through an extended journey, the 30th birthday forces you to stop, turn, and review the miles you have come.

What makes it particularly traumatic is the fact it is the first of such milestones encountered. The 10th birthday is a joyous occasion. One's personage is somehow enhanced by having a double digit age. Ahead are the exciting teen years.

Shedding the burdensome stigma of being a teenager makes the 20th birthday momentous. Adulthood has been achieved. The past is merely preparation.

But by the time a person reaches 30 he is expected to have "become something." He suddenly realizes that those long anticipated days of preparation should now be bearing fruit.

Peering back from the milestone last week, I was troubled by the apparent lack of advancement. The traveled path, in spite of considerable effort, looked so brief.

Under that cloud I accompanied two of the short people to the skating rink Saturday night. While Allison has honed her skills somewhat, Aaron still spends most of his time clutching for support as he falls. He is, however, undaunted and his sojourns on the floor are short.

After warming up with a few creative spills, he set out to traverse the perimeter of the rink. It was a long and arduous journey. He would fall, get up, skate briefly, then fall again. Sixteen times he fell and sixteen times he shook his head, picked himself up, and tried again. I was reminded of e.e. cummings' "clumsily striving children."

When he finally got back around to where I was standing he fell with a crash at my feet. I fought off a laugh because his face was so intent, so earnest.

As I helped him up he said, "Did you see how fast I skated, Dad?"

The human spirit is glorious.

Driving home from the rink amid the delighted and proud comments of the short people, I looked back quickly from the milestone and was overwhelmed by the progress.... ~T. Stucky

March 27, 1998

2008-03-22T08:37:00.002-06:00

A week ago Saturday our favorite high school basketball teams concluded their successful seasons with a loss. The following day our favorite college basketball team did the same. Monday a cold, dreary rain fell all day. Tuesday the same. Thursday brought blizzard.

Two days of heart wrenching loss followed by days of dismal weather prompted sullen contemplation of sport, of winning and losing, of life's humbling setbacks.

James Michener, who claimed to have "blindly, loyally, and often stupidly cheered for the Philadelphia Phillies through bad years and worse," said the experiences developed character. When a young literary critic told him his writing seemed exceedingly optimistic about the human race and raised the question of whether Michener had a sense of tragedy, the novelist replied, "young man, when you root for the Phillies, you acquire a sense of tragedy."

The same, it seems can be said of those Kansas University fans who spend their winters falling in love with the Jayhawks, cheer regular season victory after regular season victory, then watch their beloved become roadkill on the highway to the Final Four. As opposed to the Phillies, who until recent years had a legacy of diamond ineptitude, the Jayhawks have the winningest record in college basketball over the past decade. But like the Phillies, the Jayhawk season ends early. This year, like Caesar, KU took a shiver in the back on the Ides of March.

More than 600 Kansas high schools took the court in December with their sights set on winning a state championship. In the end, twelve teams achieved their goal-twelve teams cheered at the final buzzer. At the collegiate level, thousands of teams are winnowed down to Sweet Sixteens and Great Eights and Final Fours, and finally National Champions. For all but the chosen few, the final buzzer carries the sound of loss.

We laud the winners-those who pay the price, who spend extra hours in the weight room and gym, who hone their skills, who sacrifice and give their all to the team. They are models to emulate.

But, Vince Lombardi to the contrary, winning is not the only thing. Pete Hamill eloquently wrote of Brooklyn Dodger pitcher Sal Maglie, who in the 1956 World Series "hauled his thirty-nine-year-old body to the mound inning after inning, gave everything he had, held the Yankees to a few scattered hits and two runs - and lost. That day Don Larson pitched his perfect game: no runs, no hits, no errors. Yet, to me, the afternoon belonged to Maglie - tough, gallant, and a loser.

"Winning isn't 'the only thing.' Such an idea muddles the idea of competition, not simply in sports, but in all aspects of our lives. Winning isn't the only thing in love, art, marriage, commerce, or politics; it's not even the only thing in sports.

"Great athletes teach us that winning isn't everything, but struggle is-the struggle to simply get up in the morning or to see hope through the minefields of despair."

Winning isn't everything, Hamill concluded, living is the thing. "...and in life, defeat and victory are inseparable brothers."

Area high school teams who came home from sub-state or state tournaments without the big trophy, and the Jayhawks who fell well short of their aspirations spent the weekend in the melancholy late winter rain and snow. When the sun returned and spring arrived with its revitalizating warmth, the great athletes began anew their efforts to roll the boulder up the mountain.

Whether they reach the peak or not, they serve as a noble example for us all. ~T. Stucky

March 20, 1986

2008-03-17T09:11:00.002-06:00

The wind ripped a page from the calendar this week, revealing March. It stripped dirt from fields and used it to soil the sky. The wearing of hats or skirts demanded constant attention.

After slapping you about, like a barn cat toying with a doomed mouse, the wind filled your mouth with grit and sent you on your way feeling abused. March is like that - a bully of a month we must suffer to reach April. (April may well be the cruelest time, but March is doubtless the most pug-ugly.)

Watching the wind carrying topsoil away Monday afternoon conjured an image which had been pushed to memory's back attic. It was a March afternoon in 1963. Those were relatively tranquil days - no one had heard of Lee Harvey Oswald, Viet Nam was a distant country of minor concern, the Everly Brothers were as wild as musicians got.

A young boy walks in a line with his classmates from the school room to the front gate. It is 3:15, the end of another day of organized education. Just before reaching the front gate the boy breaks from the line to pull his bicycle from the rack - a 26 incher, red with white stripes, the chain guard and front fender are loose, wrapped around the box handlebars are canvas carrying bags. The boy, in true Horatio Alger fashion, has started down the road toward financial success as a paperboy.

He bids his fellows good-bye until the morrow and pedals west, through a neighborhood of prim, brick houses. The sun is warm, but a stiff westerly breeze makes pedaling difficult. He stands on the pedals, forcing them down, leaning, face down, into the wind.

The life of a paperboy has its advantages. Primary among them is having change that jingles in jean pockets. A boy must have the means to buy baseball cards, and a paper route provides it. Ambitious lads could pay their weekly paper bills and still have ten to twelve bucks left over. This particular lad, lacking somewhat in ambition, was content to end the week with six to eight bucks.

Of almost equal importance to the monetary rewards were the social benefits - paperboys always had an excuse for ringing the doorbell of the class sweetheart. (Ding dong. "Would you like to order the paper? Oh, hi, Patti, I didn't know you lived here.")

But there were also three curses which came with the canvas carrying bags and the boxes of rubber bands and the collection tickets - snarling dogs, Sunday mornings, and the wind. Each was abhorrent.

Eventually, a paperboy got to know the dogs on his route; which ones could be blustered into submission, which ones had barks and no bites, which ones had bites and no barks. Routes could be adjusted to avoid the worst of the measly curs. Due to the repetition of the route - papers were delivered every day, rain or shine - truces between boy and canine were finally drawn.

Sunday mornings were something else again. Although every other day of the week the papers were delivered in the afternoon, on Sunday they were delivered early; before the sun came up, before anyone with any sense was out on the street. Some paperboys got a thrill out of clambering out of bed at 4 a.m. to pedal down dark sidewalks, breaking the silence of the night by plopping a thick paper down on cool concrete.

This particular paperboy, pedaling now against the March breeze, never got a thrill out of setting an alarm on Saturday night and having it rattle him from his sleep while the moon was still high. In fact, he learned to despise Saturday nights, Sunday mornings and the relentless tick, tick, tick of that clock.

But he was not thinking of Sunday morning this afternoon. Rather he was thinking about the wind - the final paperboy curse. The canvas bags caught the wind, making progress even more strenuous. But finally he reached the station, loaded his bags with 47 papers, and rode slowly off toward his first delivery.

He never reached it. The wind was too strong. His legs were too weak. There was too much gravel in the gutter. The excuses were endless; excuses which would never have escaped the lips of Horatio Alger.

The paperboy fell with his bike, the newspapers spilling out onto the street. The wind wasted no time ripping them apart and blowing them in pieces down the sidewalk, through the yards, and on, forever. He sat there, bruised in the gutter, and watched them dance away.

March is the bully we must suffer to reach April.... ~ T. Stucky

March 19, 1981

2008-03-13T17:56:00.002-06:00

No household is complete without one. You may have a fancy toothbrush holder, a self-cleaning oven, a garden hose nozzle, and two phillips screwdrivers, but unless you have The Jar there is a lacking in the home place.

At an early age we became aware of the importance of The Jar. Dad was busy getting the lawnmower ready for its summer workout. Carburetor parts were strewn from one end of the back porch to the other. Everything, it seemed, which was needed to make that mower function was laying within arm's reach.

But then, as he sat amid the mower litter, Dad said with reverence, "Go get me The Jar."

There it was on the top shelf, reigning majestically over the utility room. It was tall, thick and clean with a shiny brass lid. When its contents were gingerly poured out onto the porch a wonder was revealed. There were pieces of wire, springs, tacks, fishhooks, instructions for repairing the kitchen plumbing, two links from a bicycle chain, a piece of hose, a spark plug, two long toggle bolts, three peculiar chunks of metal, a dial from the radio, a used piece sandpaper, some kite string, seven paper clips, a bent curtain hanger, and a quarter-full tube of grease. The remaining space was filled with nuts, bolts, screws, nails and washers of every conceivable size.

It was a marvel that so much could be contained in one jar. But then, this was no normal jar, this was The Jar.

After a moments search, Dad found the spring he desired and in no time at all the mower was roaring like a hungry beast prowling for grass.

The scene would repeat itself innumerable times. Whenever repairs were made to the car, the house, or the implements, the potent words were uttered. "Go get me The Jar." And The Jar never failed. It always contained just the right piece to complete the task. As time passed, other things were added to The Jar. When a job was finished and parts remained, they were granted the honor of residing in The Jar. Regardless of what was shoved in, The Jar always expanded just enough to incorporate it.

When a young person leaves home he bids goodbye to Dad, Mom and siblings. He also says adieu to The Jar. It is a difficult void to fill. There is no magic container to turn to when a nail or spring or fishhook is needed. There is no tube of grease nor chunk of metal. It is not an easy time. Washers and nuts and bolts and screws must be purchased. Nowhere is there to be found a dial from a radio. But, slowly, extra parts do accumulate and they are piled in a jar on a shelf somewhere.

Last week, while framing pictures, there developed a need for a small hanging hook. Just before hopping into the car and heading for Prairie Lumber, we strolled into the kitchen. And there it was, up on the top shelf, reigning majestically over the pantry, The Jar.

Pouring its acquired wealth onto the table we realized everything was there; the instructions for repairing the kitchen plumbing, the nuts, the bolts, the two links of bicycle chain. There also was a small hanging hook.

After ten years of marriage, our household is finally complete.... ~T. Stucky

March 4, 1982

2008-03-10T16:24:00.003-06:00

Nobody likes pedestrians anymore. There was a time prior to Henry Ford when self ambulation was the only way to go. Walking was a respectable method of movement. No longer.

Those without vehicles are relegated to second class status--nobody wants ya if ya ain't got da wheels. I never realized how true that was until last Thursday when, because our car was in the shop for repairs, I found myself on the streets of Hutchinson with nothing but legs for locomotion. It was a humbling experience.

Drivers race by in their glistening metal beasts, their noses in the air, their glassy eyes gazing through the windshield. Sometimes drivers wave to other drivers, but drivers never wave to pedestrians. The class chasm is not to be bridged.

Next to the curb walks the pedestrian, plodding, eyes watching for broken bottles, ears filled with the racket of traffic, nose filled with fumes. With no radio to cover the city's chaos, a pedestrian often talks to himself. Some even stroll the boulevards singing. As a result, drivers think pedestrians are addlepated. In fact, pedestrians would just rather hear themselves than the engine of an old Ford.

The city feels different on foot. Its sounds and sights are more intense, the scars more apparent, the beauty undistorted. Pedestrians know you can't appreciate a city from the driver's seat. You have to get out and touch it. Pedestrians know a lot of things.

They know alleys are gracious places. Drivers view alleys as dark, sinister caverns which are to be avoided. But pedestrians see alleys as a short cut to somewhere. They may be filled with garbage cans, graffiti, and oil coated puddles, but they save steps and for pedestrians there is no greater attribute.

While walking in the alley behind Main Street in Hutch, I came upon a veteran pedestrian. His white unkept hair stuck out in flurries from his soiled hat. A four day growth of gray stubble accented his aging face. One eye was permanently closed by a scar, probably resulting from a blow administered by a driver, which ran from the bridge of his nose to his cheek. His good eye was cloudy with smoke from the cigarette he had just rolled and stuck in his toothless mouth. He walked with a limp as if one leg was slightly shorter than the other.

We nodded in greeting--pedestrians don't talk much except to themselves. Being new at public ambulation I watched him closely, hoping to improve my technique. He kept his head down, no doubt watching for puddles or broken glass, but periodically he would lift his weak eye toward the heavens, apparently searching the skies for a sign. When no sign appeared, he continued on, eyes downcast.

Thinking this must be the way of seasoned pedestrians I, too, followed his routine. In unison we walked, stopped and gazed skyward, and then walked again. When we had stopped the third time, the sign the old-timer had been searching for revealed itself.

A flock of pigeons passed overhead and he stumbled to the edge of the alley and pressed himself tight against the wall. I followed suit just in time. The pigeons dropped their message all over the alley.

Drivers watch pigeons and glory in their flight. Pedestrians watch pigeons and worry about their message.

Nobody, not even the birds, likes pedestrians anymore.... ~T. Stucky

March 8, 1979

2008-03-08T08:22:00.002-06:00

A few times in the last weeks, Aaron has grown weary of listening to typewriters clicking and has turned on the 1940 vintage television which is part of our office furniture. He is usually met by the smiling face of Romper Room's Miss Marti.

Romper Room has over the years become a children's television tradition, but if you have not watched it recently, a synopsis may be in order.

The idea of the show is that an attractive, smiling, gentle lady (Miss Marti) is solely responsible for the entertainment of six preschool age children as well as the children watching in the sanctity of their own homes. The preschoolers on the show take part in delightful games, delightful stories, and delightful situations while asking delightful questions.

The show is a half hour of bliss--most of the time. Sometimes, the man who screens the youngsters for the show blunders, changing the entire complexion of the program. Now and then a little tow-headed kid, usually named Tommy, who sports the most devious of grins, finds himself on the show. He attempts to make the most of his half hour in the limelight by doing his level best to get Miss Marti to take a swing at him.

When the kids are instructed to lightly toss their small rubber balls into the air and then catch them, Tommy rifles his into the camera. While the other kids are walking around mooing like cows, Tommy is perched on the desk crowing like a rooster. When Miss Marti looks into her "Magic Mirror" to see all the children in television land, Tommy beans her with a cupcake.

Incredible as it may seem, Miss Marti, a graduate of the Mary Tyler Moore School for the Terminally Gleeful, continues smiling, says something like "Tommy, good do-bees don't hit Miss Marti with cupcakes," and then carries on, pausing only briefly to wipe the side of her face.

Bearing in mind that there is already too much violence on television, we would like to see, just once, for her own sanity as well as ours, Miss Marti completely lose control. To see her grab little Tommy, shove a rubber ball in one ear, a cupcake in the other, and then hang him by his thumbs from a ceiling beam would do our hearts good.... ~T. Stucky

March 19, 1987

2008-03-04T08:32:00.002-06:00

There is a hint of a tiny drop of blood on our living room carpet. You must look close to see it. It's there because a referee called an intentional foul in the Salina Bi-Centennial Center Thursday afternoon.

Such are the relations of life.

Haven's boys earned themselves a trip to the state basketball tournament with a victory over Nickerson in the sub-state finals at Chaparral. On the strength of their 21-2 record, they were seeded fourth and were pitted against Mulvane in the opening round of state competition.

We debated making a journalistic trip to Salina for Thursday's game, but because of prior engagements and because we knew the Wildcat boys would handle Mulvane and advance to play Friday and Saturday we remained close to the home fires.

Although Haven fell behind in the first half, they came on strong after intermission and took a four-point edge into the final minutes of play. Haven's misfires at the free throw line in the final seconds gave Mulvane an opportunity to sneak back into contention and with ten ticks of the clock remaining, they took a 59-58 lead.

Then came the fateful whistle. Haven's Gerry Dickey was going for the basketball as he has all year, attempting to force a turnover to give the Wildcats a final chance to clutch victory. But the referee blew the whistle and called an intentional foul, giving Mulvane two free throws and most importantly, possession of the ball. One blown whistle does not a game make, but it did vanquish Haven's state title hopes.

As a result of that whistle, we did not travel to Salina Friday and Saturday. As a result of that whistle we were at a pitch party Saturday night.

Pitch parties are a Midwest social phenomenon. People in the East gather at cocktail parties to guzzle martinis and discuss how much influence William Safire's wife has on his daily column. In the West, they congregate on the beach with the latest hallucinogen of choice and discuss the impact of El Nino on the AIDS virus.

In the Midwest, our lives still salted by the work ethic, we feel uneasy about gathering just to drink and talk. Idle hands are the devil's workshop. So we shuffle cards and we make bids and we keep score and in between the hands we discuss life for a while. The conversation is light-hearted, children being mentioned much more often than William Safire. AIDS is more the punch line of a joke than a real concern.

The advantage of a pitch party, as opposed to a Midwest party without cards, is that there is social circulation. By winning a round a couple advances to the next table and changes partners. Parties without pitch resemble an Old Mennonite revival meeting--men on this side, women on that side. Pitch brings the sexes together comfortably.

While there is mingling there is also competition, another element dear to the hearts of Midwesterners. At the end of the evening, scores are tabulated and functional prizes are presented to the high and low scorers.

So it was that we brought home from the party a nifty, all-purpose-get-lost-in-the-woods-have-no-fear pocket knife. And so it was that Sunday morning Carly was examining the knife and closed the blade (she's a year away from Brownie knife safety training) on her finger.

Before she could arrest the trickle of blood with a band-aid, a wee drop floated to the carpet.

And so it is that pain was inflicted on our shortest offspring and a stain was inflicted on our carpet by some nameless referee in Salina.

It just makes you wonder why he blew that whistle, doesn't it.... ~T. Stucky

February 18, 1982

2008-02-25T19:48:00.002-06:00

There are times when the short people we live with are difficult to please. The rest of the time they are impossible to please.

Last week we purchased a new car--it's not really new and some might question whether it is really a car. While a 1967 Austin Healy Sprite is by no means a family car, unless your family believes adamantly in birth control, for short trips hither and yon it is ideal.

We envisioned the little folks being overwhelmed with the excitement of dashing about in the convertible on a balmy spring day, wind racing through their hair. We visualized glee as they rode around town in the passenger seat of a flashy sportscar. We thought exhilaration.

We received snickers.

There was no comment when I offered to drive two of the short people to school in the Sprite one particularly cold day last week. They simply glanced at each other and nodded, figuring the alternative to driving in that four wheeled toy was plodding through the snow on foot.

Waiting at the curb, the engine idling roughly, I watched their faces as they emerged from the house. They were giggling, but it was not a giggle of delight. It was a dad-is-really-weird giggle.

As the eldest short person opened the door she scrutinized the interior of the car before entering. She looked long at the carpetless floor, the ragged seat, the weathered window.

"Cute, dad," she said, sarcasm oozing from her lips like ketchup from a bottle.

I tried to be positive, telling her she would enjoy the ride. She carefully laid down a piece of writing paper on the seat before sitting down.

"I think you need to clean it up a little," she said, glorying in her understatement.

I told her she would enjoy the ride.

"What's that noise?" When I told her it was the heater she said, "All that noise and cold air too, huh? Cute, dad."

As we pulled out she suggested the radio be switched on to drown out the noise of the heater. When I told her the radio was in the back and not connected, she rolled her eyes in response. I told her with a fancy sportscar there was no need for a radio, the hum of the engine was like music. Her eyes continued rolling.

By the time we reached the corner, the front window was fogged.

"The defroster doesn't work, right?" she asked and answered. I considered asking her to walk the rest of the way, but instead I just smiled and told her how much she was enjoying the ride.

"I think you need to paint it," she said. I reminded her that yellow was her favorite color. She just smirked.

We had reached the school and by now I was sorry I had volunteered my services. I told them both how much they had enjoyed the ride and was met with another burst of giggles. They stumbled out, slammed the door and headed for class. But the the eldest turned as if she had forgotten something and walked back to where I still sat idling.

As she stuck her head in the door, I knew what she was going to say--she was going to thank me for driving them to school and she was going to tell me that she really did like the car and that she couldn't wait until spring when we could drive around with the top down and she was going to tell me how much she had enjoyed the ride.

"I must tell you," (Here it comes, I thought.) "I'm not too impressed." And she turned and disappeared into the school.

I limped home, the fancy sportscar looking more like a hunk of junk with every passing block.... ~T.Stucky

February 6, 2004

2008-02-21T07:57:00.003-06:00

My Father died Friday evening. He leaned back in the easy chair which has lately become the extent of his domain, gurgled, convulsed, then went limp. His heart, according to the defibrillator installed in one of his numerous heart surgeries, recorded the "incident," later printing a straight line of more than an inch on a medical graph.

My dad was defined by his heart. A heart condition forced him from his Kansas dairy farm to the supposedly therapeutic desert clime of Phoenix, Arizona. His heart changed the course of his life, and the lives of his family. More than once in the five decades since he sold his Jerseys and headed west, he was told he had but a short time left to live. More than a few times he had been loaded into an ambulance and sped to the hospital. More than a few times his family had said good-bye. And more than a few times he rallied, defying medical experts to return home.

He read "Seabiscuit" last year and then went to see the movie. Red Pollard, the jockey who overcame one calamity after another to ride The Biscuit in his final, victorious race, was my dad's favorite character. "He sure went through a lot, didn't he," he said after watching the film. "And he just kept coming back."

The same could be said of my father. Despite a heart that failed him, he never failed his family. When I was young he was there to catch the baseball on the side of the house, pretending my fast ball stung his hand through the catcher's mitt. He was there to take us camping, to drive us to church, to read us bedtime stories, to show us how to live a life. There was nothing fancy about him, no pretense. He was comfortable being himself.

For one with a heart so weak, my dad had more heart than anyone I know. Honestly kind, caring, considerate, he was absolutely the nicest man I ever met. As I think about it, I can only recall him being mad twice-once because a lawnmower wouldn't start on a blistering summer day, and once because I failed to put oil in my car. Mad as he was, "Jupiter!" was as profane as I ever heard him.

With youthful arrogance I listened cynically to his holiday prayers. In his simple way, he would express appreciation for family at Thanksgiving, give thanks for the gift of love ones at Christmas, offer praise for being together around the Easter table, bless "this food for the nourishment of our bodies" every Sunday. As time past the cynicism faded. As time past, I came to recognize the depth of his character. As time past, I came to realize not all fathers were always there.

His devotion to family carried to the next generation. If he wasn't on the way to or from the hospital, he was on the way to or from a basketball game, or football game or soccer match or track meet. Regardless of the contest's outcome, regardless whether his grandchildren played well or not, he always hugged them when it was over and said, "Good game."

Friday evening my dad died. But the monitor attached to his heart detected the lack of a beat and sent a shock to the still muscle. Emergency medical technicians administered aid. He who had been dead, was revived. A few hours later he was once again thanking nurses for being so kind to him, apologizing for being such a nuisance, encouraging his adult children to go home from the hospital because they needed to get up and work the next morning.

Driving to the emergency room, uncertain what awaited us, I considered the world without him. It wasn't the first time, but this "incident" had a finality to it, pressing thoughts to go places they try to avoid. When I squeezed his hand in the emergency room, he said "Your hands are warm."

"Cold heart, " I thought, "Not like yours." ~T. Stucky

February 23, 1978

2008-02-16T13:01:00.002-06:00

Candid Camera would have a field day watching pedestrians attempting to navigate the ice-covered street of Pretty Prairie. The street-crossing techniques are as varied as the citizenry, but they fall into four main categories.
First, and most prevalent, is the "Arms Out, Eyes Down, Jaw Tightly Set, This Street Won't Get Me Shuffle". These people seldom fall while taking their small, choppy steps, but they do often bump into passing vehicles.
The second category is the "I'm Indestructible March". These folks, usually male, completely ignore the hazards of the street as they maintain the same pace they use when walking across the living room. We can only hope they don't fall in their living rooms as often as they fall on Main Street.
The "Oh, Please Help Me God Crawl" is the third version. The people who use this technique seldom venture from the safety of home, but when they do, they are prepared for the worst. They wear extra padded clothing, carry a list of next-of-kin, and constantly repeat out loud prayers for safety they have memorized in their idle hours at home. People in this group are easy to spot--their mouths continue to move even as they sit in the middle of the street.
The final group does the "Ice-Skater's Waltz". Usually whistling, they slide across the street, fall a time or two, laugh each time, and upon reaching the other side, turn and skate across again. This group has a tendency to decrease in numbers as winter wears on... ~T. Stucky

2008-02-14T10:05:00.001-06:00

"Love is a feeling,
an ideal,
universally accepted as the essence of life."
~ T. Stucky

February 5, 1981

2008-02-11T20:07:00.000-06:00

Like everyone else, on Sunday we pulled the month of January from the calendar and there, like four weeks of bad road, was February. Of all the months of the year February is the most maligned, the most despised, the most dreaded. Only August comes close to matching February's disfavor.
It's not that February by itself is so bad -- January and March are not really much different. It has just been the victim of poor timing. February comes during the depths of winter. It is the veritable pit of the season. It is north winds and sub-zero chill factors. It is snow flurries which are no longer charming and snow drifts which are not longer white.
February is a time when your nose runs, your toes ache, and your eyes tear. It is a month of scraping ice from your windshield. February is to the year what migraines are to the forehead.
January has its New Year, its resolutions, its optimism. March has its inkling of spring, milder temperatures, and sometimes Easter. February has Groundhog Day -- not much to celebrate really. The groundhog sticks his head from the burrow, sees its shadow, and we all get rewarded with February.
Two of our most famous Presidents had the misfortune to be born in February. If ever there was proof that people born under the meanest of circumstance could grow up to be somebody, this is it.
We respond to the month's harsh bitterness by handing it the ultimate insult -- we mispronounce its name. Instead of Feb-ru-ary, we call it Feb-uary. It's not that we don't know any better. It's just our way of getting back at it for what it does to us.
In spite of our animosity and our name calling, it remains the second month of the year. Twenty-eight days waiting to be plodded through.
At least the calendar makers had the good sense to make it the shortest month of the year. Can you imagine thirty-one days of February.... ~T. Stucky

Friday, February 9, 2001

2008-02-09T09:43:00.000-06:00

We don't laugh as much as we once did. Four short people, spouting the wild tales of the day, no longer cluster around our dinner table, filling the evening with hilarity. And the natural passage of time tends to erode the edges of a punchline, turning surprising twists into just another familiar phrase.
Laughter, as it turns out, may be overrated anyway. It is not, Reader's Digest to the contrary, the "best medicine." In a recent article, Robert Provine noted, "Laughter did not evolve to make us feel good or improve our health. Certainly, laughter unites people, and social support has been shown in studies to improve mental and physical health. Indeed, the presumed health benefits of laughter may be coincidental consequences of its primary goal: bringing people together.
"Most people think of laughter as a simple response to comedy, or a cathartic mood-lifter. Instead, after 10 years of research on this little-studied topic, I concluded that laughter is primarily a social vocalization that binds people together. It is a hidden language that we all speak. It is not a learned group reaction but an instinctive behavior programmed by our genes. Laughter bonds us through humor and play."
Laughter may not be what we thought it was, and it may not cure the common cold, but it does provide nonverbal confirmation that folks are sharing an experience. And in deep February, that offers hope.
So, in the interest of providing a unifying chuckle, we dip into the internet humor pool.
-- I live in a semi-rural area. We recently had a new neighbor call the local township administrative office to request the removal of the Deer Crossing sign on our road. The reason: too many deer were being hit by cars and he didn't want them to cross there anymore.
-- My daughter went to a local Taco Bell and ordered a taco. She asked the person behind the counter for "minimal lettuce." He said he was sorry, but they only had iceberg.
-- I was at the airport, checking in at the gate when an airport employee asked, "Has anyone put anything in your baggage without your knowledge?" To which I replied, "If it was without my knowledge, how would I know?" He smiled knowingly and nodded, "That's why we ask."
-- The stoplight on the corner buzzes when it's safe to cross the street. I was crossing with an intellectually-challenged coworker of mine when she asked if I knew what the buzzer was for. I explained that it signals blind people when the light is red. Appalled, she responded, "What on earth are blind people doing driving?"
-- When my husband and I arrived at an automobile dealership to pick up our car, we were told the keys had been locked in it. We went to the service department and found a mechanic working feverishly to unlock the driver's side door. As I watched from the passenger side, I instinctively tried the door handle and discovered that it was unlocked. "Hey," I announced to the technician, "it's open!" To which he replied, "I know, I already got that side."
-- A woman was taking a shower when her 2 year-old son came into the bathroom and wrapped himself in toilet paper. Although he made a mess, he looked adorable, so she ran for her camera and took a few shots. The photographs came out so well that she had copies made and included one with each of her Christmas cards. Days later a relative called about the picture, laughing hysterically and suggesting the woman take a closer look. Puzzled, she stared at the photo and was shocked to discover that in addition to her son she had captured her reflection in the bathroom mirror--wearing nothing but a camera!
-- A teacher noticed that a little boy in the back of the class was squirming around, scratching his crotch and not paying attention. She went back to find out what was going on. He was quite embarrassed and whispered that he had just recently been circumcised and he was quite itchy. The teacher told him to go to the principal's office and phone his mother and as her what he should do about it. H did as told and then returned to class. Suddenly, there was a commotion at the back of the room. The teacher went to investigate only to find the boy at his desk with his pants down. "I thought I told you to call your mom," she said. "I did," the boy replied. "And she told me that if I could stick it out till noon, she'd come and pick me up from school." ~ T. Stucky

2008-02-05T13:38:00.000-06:00

"We were not created by God in the form of Adam and Eve to play out some divine scenario. We created God, gave him our form, gave him the attributes we would most like to have, gave him also the darker side of psyche—the vengeance, the loneliness, the disappointment, the longing. Our meaning comes not from afar, but from within. We, individually, decide the meaning of the rose, the meaning of the universe, the meaning of our roles in it. At our center is the urge to live, in peace, another day. As we expand from our center, realizing that this life on earth is everything we will ever have, that we can make it a heaven or we can make it a hell, we recognize from our myths that there is a right and a wrong, a life-giving and a life-taking, that some things provide peace and other do not, some things which are more real than others." ~ T. Stucky

2008-02-04T12:47:00.000-06:00

My Dad, with the unwavering support of my Mom was the owner & editor of 2 small town newspapers: the Ninnescah Valley News and the Mount Hope Clarion. Dad's editorial column of nearly 30 years was called "and in this corner... t&n" - it was beloved by all who read it. My Dad passed away on the 23rd of January, after battling lymphoma for 9 months and I have since had numerous requests to publish his "corners" as they have become known. While he did create the newspapers on his laptop for the past 8-10 years, he never once saved it on a disc or jump drive, so the only copies we have of those editorial columns are in the actual printed newspapers...piles of which can be found in literary towers in my folk's basement. So publishing them becomes a process of riffling through 30 years of weekly newspapers, typing them into my laptop and posting them here; in this corner of the world wide web.