Winning and Losing

    We want to be champions of our own stories. Sometimes we are the goats, the losers. Overall, we wish to be the heroes of the arcing narrative, from beginning to end. Birth to death, we wish to be the protagonists. 

    Sometimes we are the enemies of our own stories. We can ruin our own paths. But the point is to eventually overcome and be the winner.

    In life we can have regrets and embarrassment in past trials and blows, times where we failed. But did we recover and come back, stronger, wiser, better than before?

    Through faith in higher powers that works.

    But in reality we can fall and not recover so well.

    When we disappoint our parents, our teachers, our bosses, our children, our spouses.

    When we see a light or a spark or a smile of love and acceptance that was once there but it has gone away.

    We try to get it back.

    To win, to prevail.

 Indiana Hoosier Football: We are Number 126!

    Indiana, under maverick master Curt Cignetti, went and did some of the most unthinkable last year, culminating this January and winning the national championship, ending with a 16-0 final unblemished record. Wow. I will still think this was a pipe dream 5, 10, or thirty years from now. Till my dying day.

    IU has historically been one of the worst programs in college football. Futility year in and year out, despite some good years or epochs on occasion, like 1945, 1967, 1979, 1988, 1991. 2007 was all right, and 2020 (the pandemic season) was decent. But overall, Indiana has been a door mat in the spectrum of the college football world.

    Not any more. Cignetti has made them a powerhouse. Since 2024.

    That said, in its 138-year history of playing intercollegiately, IU is ranked 126th in winning percentage, now out of 138 teams (135 qualify as having enough seasons, maybe 12, to qualify), which means that Indiana has a long way to go. A .424 winning percentage. Behind Buffalo at .425.

    The top programs are 1) Ohio State, .737, 2) Alabama .733 3) Notre Dame .733 4) Michigan .732

5) Bosie State .724.

    And then there college football teams, FBS, or Division I, that ranked 6th through 125th, with better winning records that IU at Bloomington.

    Of course, many or most of them have not won a national championship as Indiana has just done. So, neener neener, neener.

    BYU, my other alma mater, beloved team, is rated 36th all time, with a decent .584 winning percentage. In 101 years of playing. 

    Maybe a few more Cignetti years of greatness can get us to 100th all-time?

    Here's hoping, Hoosiers!

    Go IU. Fight, fight, fight!

Houses of Worship and Human/Godly Progression

    I have missed many church Sundays in a row. Five? Going back into May. I was paying my dues to my country, my profession, and attending a different kind of mass, or sacrament. Not religious, but more secular. I led one session of a non-denominational Bible class one Sunday. Maybe three ago? Attended by three of us. Better than nothing.

    However, this is not my  community, and this is not the goal. The goal, or objective of orgnized religion-- any of them-- is to improve the soul and souls of all of us, bringing us closer to God and one another, His creations. Buddha, Allah, Krishna and Vishnu, or Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. We need them, or they need us to be together in communities to be more effective.

    I need my fellow church goers to be a more complete believer and practioner.

    I need them, they need me, and God needs me to be individually whole and collectively participatory.

    Organized religion does work, especially when it is not exploitative. It can be twisted and used for malign purposes.

    God is supreme; He is in charge,  but allows us to make gross errors and mistakes. He needs us to organize ourselves and be active in doing good for more, more of His creations.

    I need to go to church this Sunday. Get right with my God, and His Son, and my fellow saints.

    Sin miedo ni temor.

    The longest church-less streak since perhaps my sick month of July into August of 1990 in Chile.

    Even at Fort Polk in 2019 I attended a Protestant and Catholic service, and I was maybe only down there 26 days... Less Sundays than this time.

    I need my Sunday worship service to plug in to what God has for all of us, starting with me.

    We must understand better how these consecrated places of worship are for our good.

 Presidents of the United States of America - Comparisons

Abraham Lincoln grew up in poor circimstances, and made it to D.C. where slave states decided to rebel. He was what our nation needed for freedom. It was an awful, bloody, Civil War. But we advanced.

    Donald Trump grew up wealthy, and successful. The American people chose him twice. Wanting success and prosperity. Does he deliver to most Americans what we desire? So some think he is too impulsive or Anti-foreigner. Maybe.

    

    Biden tried to carry over Obama initiatives of fairness and opportunity. Bush struck out for fundamental values.

    Clinton, the other Bush, Reagan. Carter and Ford, then back to Nixon, Johnson, Kennedy, Eisenhower. Truman and Roosevelt, back to Hoover and into the 1920s. Coolidge, Harding, who else one hundred plus years ago?

    We, the citizens, the historians, the scholars, the eonomists, the analysts. We look at them now and in the past to assess their leadership, or cowardice, or courage. Their mistakes and their triumphs. Their skills or their bumblings.

    Life and death decisions, morally correct or wrong choices and stumbles. They have many people advising them, including the U.S. people.

    We the people.

    May we be good and triumph.

    

    

 Between Life and Death -- Thoughts

    I was told that some people died. I believed it. My heart was troubled, and it was moved to think of others. Including the survivors. We lose people all the time. But hopefully not too close. We pray and take care not to be hurt or cut down in the same ways.

    But it comes, and closely. It will, it does.

    Am I negative, am I pessimistic? No, this is our reality.

    Surely, we celebrate life. Youth, and middle age, and old age, all of it.

    We love and cherish the living. But we recognize those that have passed on.

    Perhaps no one died?

    Perhaps we all surived a trying month of tests and trials?

God bless us.

    The living and the dead.

    Like the writer of Ulyssess, James Joyce, in 1922. His long short story.

    The Dead.

    I heard that 

 Gratitude for Science and History

    We must be grateful. Most of us. Some have it harder than others.

    Because the same life and science that allows us to live and breathe

 Germany is Out! Way to Go, Paraguay!

    Raus, ausschlander! Get out! They have had enough success for a few lifetimes, in my opinion.

    Good. Gut. Enough of the dominant powers. 

    We want some underdogs.

    Netherlands eliminated by Morocco. Poor Dutchmen. The best team never to win it ever.

    Who has won? Uruguay. Brazil. Italy. Argentina. Germany. France. Spain. Is that all? Ever?

    Only those 7? Wow. We need more. I have mentioned Mexico. England. Who else? Of course, the U.S.A. Or... a developing nation, even better. Who is left?

    Belgium saves itself...

    Algeria still alive, with Austria... Paraguay.