Orlando Cepeda Joins Willie Mays Beyond the Veil

    The second Hall of Famer from Puerto Rico (after Roberto Clemente) has passed. He was great, but sanctioned after his career for a marijuana bust. Too bad; he should have been inducted sooner.

    No matter, I guess, he received his due.

    Baby Bull Cha Cha, rest in peace.

 Struggle and Fight for Wealth

    Most of us put in concentrated effort, time, and work to become a functional part of the greater economy, which in turn helps us as individuals to survive or thrive in the world, where we pay for ourselves and others, which includes the taxes that we submit for the governments we live under and the benefit of all. In the world of economics all goods and services have a value; most of us are a part of it, in the big and the small.

    Disparities abound; over the centuries many have claimed that this wrong and unfair method or system of letting some to live in abject or close to desperate poverty while many are amazingly rich and powerful, and in the U.S. case most somewhere in between. The middle classes.

    We all work, some less than others. We are not remunerated the same. Some people have great ancestors and inheritance. Others have amazing talent or some luck and access and achieve high levels of pay. Some work hard, long, and smart. Many accomplish their life's goals of earning their wealth during or for preparation for retirement. Some never make it, dying prematurely.

    Each government, each culture, each community, corporation and business, we all struggle and fight to create the ways of living that we would like to attain.

    Economists, or at least many of them, like to claim to know how to fix things, or make them functional for more gain and prosperity. Politicians too. Pundits, some journalists or historians.

    Karl Marx swayed a lot of people. So has Milton Friedman. 

    What are the best ways?

 A Story that I wrote in 1993, from Provo, Utah

    I was 22 years old when I wrote this. It was my first year living in Utah, my first year of studies at Brigham Young University. I always wanted to write, but it could be hard to get things organized.

I will call it "Hector", some 30 plus years later. It had no title nor date affixed to it in my notebook.

    Hector

    When Hector was young he flew the kites in the spring with his schoolmates, and a few boys who didn't attend school. They ran and shouted as the classes ended, running towards their homes, where their fathers had helped them construct the kites, and where their mothers awaited with homemade bread, and their sisters would sing and clap, while even the street dogs frolicked in the wind, exasperated at the thought of so many boys running to and fro.

    The dusty streets became well-trodden with the commotion of spring, and the wind lifted the kites into the smiling sky, smiling for the time of year, blowing past the rainy months of winter, and gently arriving in the national holidays of September. Hector's heart soared beyond the clouds, into the rays of heaven, made blue like the western mountains, only endless and infinite and sculpted by dozens of earthbound pilots. Sailors of the fathomless sunny sea all edging their way through eternity.

    But that was long ago, and Hector had since grown out of childish exploits and adventure, and since then had sunken old in a wheelchair. No one was left of the family, a neighbor brought by bread freshly baked, but it wasn't the same as his mother's. His father had died quite young, his sister had married and was across the mountains. His mother was just recently buried in the town's high cemetery. It was impossible to go there in a wheelchair. 

    Hector sat alone and thought. Stared out the window at the dead-end street of soot and half buried stones. He saw the neighborhood children run with their kites in the spring, forgetting about the school notebooks on their dead-end streets.

    He was skinny and frail, with deep sunken eyes. His legs didn't move. His hands were shaky, feeble and withered. The radio was his string to the eternities, yet he couldn't quite see his kite his father and he had made. He had a hard time smelling the warm sopaipilla that were brought to him by the neighborhood children. Its taste was bland like some neutral colorless clay. It warmed his mouth, but his unfeeling stomach just let it die there. His bowels just let it return to the earth by cold running water from the streams of the far-off mountain.

__________________

The notebook was found by my daughter a couple days ago; she is close in age to what I was then.

She read other random comments and words in it and said," That is where I get it from!".

It was nice to review some of these old words and thoughts.

      

 Places That Need to be Fixed

1. Israel and Palestine.  Generations have seen it devolve and spiral down into an existential morass. In the early 2000s, and even later, I tried to get into the U.S. State Department to work on this. They did not take me. Perhaps I would have been another cipher in this complete conundrum, since October 2023 fallen into a wicked state of violence, privation, and starvation.

    Deplorable, so avoidable.

2. Ukraine and Russia. Russia has been a despotic empire for centuries. They will be eaten up from within. Too much draconian oppression, they will be crushed, as they reap what they sow.

3. South Sudan. Yikes. Why all the tribal hatred? Political infighting, literal hostility and killing of innocents.

4. Yemen. Too many Hizballah-backed Houthis.

5. Syria. Still craziness among the Bashar Al-Assad government and the rest, including Islamic State.

6. New Caledonia? Natives are restless against France.

 Taking Stock, Counting Blessings

    Sometimes in life we can review things and focus on the negative. Personally, or even globally, things can seem too hard or pessimistic. This is a bit of my plight lately. And yet, there is so much to be thankful for. So much! I must evaluate and re-evaluate, and see and sense all the good. There are many, many things to appreciate and love.

    I have failed a few things lately, and I wake up thinking about those things. However, overall, I am winning. I have winning hopes and aspirations. Many of my dreams are coming together. Despite the negatives.

    What are the negatives? As a member of the military, I have not promoted as I and others have wanted. This translates in immediate lesser pay, but also reduced duties and respect and authority. This is a thing that wears on me over the years...

    But, the glasses are more than half full.

Non Heterosexual Practices and Organized Religions, in 2024

Non Heterosexual Practices and Organized Religions, 2024

    In the United States and the Western world there is a bigger than ever movement of people who are accepting and engaging in non-traditional practices of sexual behavior, marriage and human relations in homosexual and other LGBTQ+ identities and mind sets. Traditional religions have their influences and impacts, methods and ways of dealing or handling non-traditional (male and female) relationships and lifestyles, both in physical and social ways.

    Which religions are most compatible and least resistant to LGBT+ ways?

    Perhaps Buddhist philosophies are compatible? I had a Buddhist group leader who was lesbian. Makes sense, perhaps Theravada versus Mahayana versus Tibetan is different when it comes to same sex or transgender statuses.

    What about Hinduism?

    Some Christian, and Jewish sects and strains are more open to Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transgender-Plus all the other alternative sexual orientations and identities. Many are not.

    Islam? Not so much.

    Sikhs? Not sure. Shintoism? Daoism? Not sure.

    Animist and nativistic traditions? I don't know.

    What do you think?

 Was He The Say Hey Kid? Willie Mays Passes

    He played long (relatively) before my time, but I always heard of his greatness on the field. I came to believe, perhaps as a teenager in the 1980s, or later as a young adult in the 1990s, that he probably was the best player of all time. Better than Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, or any of the more recent greatest players in the more modern era.

    Willie had all the tools and was the best. I thought, and I still think.

    Yeah.

    Way to go, Willie. Thanks for being great. Or the greatest. 

    Whatever he was in the scheme of baseball, the United States, and world history, he was great.

    We appreciate and honor a life well lived, and the contributions to the game that have pushed us along in life.

    Say, hey.

 Hablando, Pensando, Comunicando

    Este ensayo, que se yo, o tal vez entrada de Blog, sera en espanol pero sin los diacriticos adecuados que merecen el idioma de castellano. Perdonenme, todos. Perdon.

    Yo, al menos, si se donde...

    Perdi el hilo de lo que estaba pensando, escribiendo.

    Yo pase mi examen ayer bien. Hoy fui al templo en espanol.

    Manana la iglesia. Que lindo.

    

 My Day was Not Great; Jerry West Was

    I was driving home in personal defeat. I was driving, thinking, searching. I was close to Three Mile Island, so I drove by there. Took some pictures. This crisis took place when I was eight years old, in the spring, so it is rather burned in my long-term memory, or my psyche.

    My psyche.

    I will be all right. Years of effort and expectation not met. 

    I was able to go by the Pennsylvania veteran's memorial cemetery. I tried to track my Uncle Harry's resting place, with his wife, my aunt, beside him who had passed 25 years before when I was in South America. 1990. I tried calling my dad, who was celebrating his 87th birthday, but then I finally remembered he was on a vacation trip. Not picking up. 

    An older man, a long-time veteran, told me that when he arrived in 1987 there were three thousand souls buried or contained there. Now there are 66,000, of which there are many spouses. Likely my uncle and aunt. Was his name Henricksen? No...

    My memory. It failed my yesterday, and then days before, and throughout my time trying to memorize such exercises, commands, and moves. Movements. Not all ingrained.

Jerry West, at age 86, lived a very well renowned and celebrated life. Accolades as the greatest, his impact as a player, coach, manager, for so long.

When I was learning more of the history of the game when I was a teen in the 1980s, I thought surely this Jerry West guy was 6'7" and an imposing figure on the court, like other big dudes who could run and shoot over the years. But he was only 6'2". His skills transcended the sport, despite his smaller stature.

    Me, I am yet shorter, and I have less impact, in greater life, and certainly on the court. I have played some hours there. In my respective circles I have had some successes, but on the day this luminary has passed, I have had another life setback.

    On my dad's birthday. Looking for my old uncle who died at age 100, in 2015. Driving home, in some defeat. Failure. A setback. Life... altering. Sort of.

    I have a few more years, hopefully, to alter the script to my favor.

    To be in my late eighties, like my dad, or Mr. West, or like my uncle who lived a few more years beyond, even a decade more. Pretty happily. I just have to do a few more things here, now.

    I know that Jerry West had some tough times across the width and breadth of his life. We all do. But we try to compensate or strive hard to make ourselves into something better, bigger. More than our height or accomplishments, on paper, we try to do and be what we want to achieve.

    May we do so. We will be better and bigger than our less successful days, and the time and circumstances of our final breaths and moment and cause of death should not define us, either.

    May we strive for the better things.

    I re-read a "Clean, Well-Lighted Place", by Ernest Hemingway. About life, age, contentment, living into the older times. Dignity. Peace of mind. Nada a nada, but clean and quiet.

    There we are.

    Three Mile Island was traumatic, but the crisis was averted, and as far as I know the place kept producing energy. Now decades later it is safe and productive. By its looks that I saw yesterday, that is what I presume.

 

    May we all be thus.

    Energy and power. Movement and momentum.

    Living and reflecting. Push on.

I like to see Demographic Growth and Changes, especially Growth of the Church of Jesus Christ

    To see Zion, or the Gospel of Jesus Christ, grow locally is great. We meet individuals and families that join the faith; we see them join us, and hopefully their lives feel better to them, and they add to ours.

    I like to see the bigger picture, in towns, cities, countries and regions.

    Like Tanzania, for example.

It is doing pretty well. Small numbers, but dynamic.

Where are people joining this Church?

Where is it decreasing?

What countries are losing population? Russia, Japan.

One is at war. How is that affecting growth?

What country is the above?

I failed to label it. I think it is Senegal. Ivory Coast.

Yes, must be.

13 June 2024.

 Bible and Scripture Misunderstanding Leads to Support of Government of Israel in Modern Day

    There are at least one hundred different Christian theologies, ideologies, doctrines, and/or interpretations of the Holy Bible. There are actually more like millions, because as each of us believers have our own ways and thoughts of what things are meaning and how to apply them within the sayings, prophecies, narratives, principles, and doctrines of the Holy Bible, we each have our own understandings and interpretations of what the words and concepts mean.

    Take the word and name and understanding of Israel, for example.

    The meaning of it in Hebrew is "God prevails", from what I have learned.

    I think is safe to say that most of us can agree on that meaning.

    However, what is Israel in 2024? 

    There is the nation state of Israel, which is currently entrenched in a brutal war in the Gaza Strip, which also has resulted in the deaths of more than five hundred Palestinians in the West Bank. Some evangelical Christians and Eretz Israel (all Jewish Holy Land advocates) refer to the sides of the places in the main Holy Land as the Biblical names, Judea and Samaria. There is no Israel proper, as named and designated in 1947 by the United Nations. The original Jewish, or Tribe of Judah area is what is interpreted by Israel being named throughout the Bible, both in the past and into the current future. Now, and what will transpire in the next years, which is prophesied or documented within the verses and chapters of the Torah, or Jewish holy scripture, and the Christian Bible, which includes the New Testament, which is mostly anathema to most things of Judaism.

    Yet, evangelical Christians, of many various sects and denominations, ardently support and claim that the modern state of Israel is the Biblical fulfillment of what the Bible, in particular the book of Revelations or Apocalypses, predicts or foreshadows will happen in the Last Days or End Times, in the time of the Advent of Jesus Christ for the second time. 

    My way of understanding is that there are Twelve Tribes of Israel, one of them being Judah, and the others all have their promises and blessings as well. Ephraim and Manasseh, which are millions of us, if not billions, are highly favored and chosen groups of people of God, as much of the covenant of the Lord and his plans as those of Judah. Most Christians have no idea about the identity and purpose of all the tribes of Israel.

    Judah has its place, but the country of Israel, as currently constituted, is not necessarily the religious and spiritual embodiment of what is promised to Judah and Israel, as according to the Torah (which admittedly I know less about), and the Christian Holy Bible, both the Old and New Testaments.

    Incidentally, the Roman Catholics, which may be a billion or more adherents, also include the Apocrypha in the Bible, which is the time between the Old and New Testaments. Many other Christians believe that those are historical documents with little or no religious, spiritual, or doctrinal value.

    Hopefully this makes sense to many of us...

   There is little consensus as to how Israel really functions today, as an interpretation of the Bible or not.

    Many of us, or even all of us, have it wrong. Who is right?

The Quest for .400 batting - Will It Happen before I Die?

    Maybe not, the short and sweet. This is an achievement that perhaps has become harder with time. The last time it happened, there were no Blacks and effectively no Asians in the sport.

    The Triple Crown, similarly, was an elusive feat, until Miguel Cabrera did it with the Tigers in 2012. For those who do not know, that is being tops in the major leagues in batting, home runs, and RBIs. (Runs batted in). He batted excellently that year, as have so many batting champions before and since.

    But hitting .400? Not since Ted Williams from before World War II. That is like when my dad was three and my mom was being born. I think this was with the Red Sox, so they were not too far away. But in 2024, my dad is almost 87 and my mom has been gone for ten years.

    One guy flirted with hitting .400 when I was a kid, and my friend's older brother was freaking out around 1979, maybe 1980. George Brett! Are you kidding me? .390 or so in July? Wow! Brian Murray got my attention, and the magazine Boys Life, which I got as a kid because of Boy Scouting, or Cub Scouting, the authors touted and venerated baseball greats! Huh. Literature about a sports.

    Huh. Later I saw that Hemingway wrote about sports and sporting things.

    That is all right. Even baseball. A. Bartlett Giamatti, a poet laureate, loved baseball.

    So, we have to care about this sport in life, in art, in the scheme of things, right?

    .400 is a thing.

    In 1994, a bittersweet magical season, Tony Gwynn was coming up close to .400 when the season was ended with the money-grubbing strike. Curse them all, owners and players.

    So, now Luis Arraez has me excited 30 years later.

    Still a fan, a mere boy in the scheme of things.

    I hope that he does it. Make Ted Williams a thing again.