Fidel, Fidel, Fidel

You finally died. That chapter of history has more or less ended. The weekend of November 25, 2016. Thanksgiving, indeed. After 90 years of doing things in your island, your way.

Dictator. Of the people? Liar. Men and women of the people allow choices. Freedom. That you did not permit. Deceiver of yourself and the masses you coerced.

We hope that a new chapter arises on that great island nation. Hopefully for the better.

A relatively small country became a large thorn in the side of the biggest power in the world, for a very long time. And the US had little answers.

Your new system was supposed to help Cuba and its Communist Revolution for the poor and the laborer, the proletariat, the lowly that assumed to benefit from the selfishness of capitalism.

But it didn't.

Now your brother is in charge, replacing you by plan and for the continuation of your failed cause.

Good riddance, Fidel.

My professors of Chile knew and believed in you, confided in you, thought that the world wide plan of Communism was right ... But then they worked for the diplomatic corps of China, then Cuba, and then East Germany, perhaps worst yet under Soviet rule. Hard to imagine a place worse than China where millions disappeared under the auspices the of the People's Republic of Mao. A terrible,  miserable, unbelievable joke.

And they, my teachers, the two Rojas, escaped from your maddening  schemes of "healing the planet" this socialistic plan of intervention.

Hog wash. It was just a new means to exploit and undermine the people.

Some got better health care or medicine, some Cubans excelled in sports and the arts. But most? Still left behind, you gran mentiroso.

Leave your people be, and move on to that God that you have denied, that you unfairly and cruelly replaced for the Cubanos relegated to the margins of your culture.

They will survive, because neither you nor your cause are God or divine. You do not have ultimate control.

Thank the Divine.

You could not admit you were wrong.

Death is the answer for you.

Friend of Che Guevara, another so-called hero who only lead people to more misery.

Fighting powers that should have been accepted.

Oh, well. At least my professor Gonzalo learned to renounce Communism by 1979.

Fidel, Fidel, Fidel. Did you never learn?

Perhaps now in the heavens.

See you there someday, amigo. We'll talk some more about your legacy.

QDEP 2016 : Now the real revolution can begin.

In a Perfect World ...

 In a Perfect World ...

In a perfect world, things would not be perfect, but things would be much better.

For starters, no one would go hungry. No humans, anyway, would suffer from the lack of food and nutrition. I don't know about all the domestic pets and beasts around, because as far as I am concerned animals exist first to help us from not starving, and then maybe for those who are blessed and privileged people can derive utility and pleasure from them. But I don't like when animals are getting better care and food than humans. Doesn't sit right, doesn't make sense to me.

Especially minors. Kids deserve food, there should be no empty stomachs. I don't care if its Greenland, Namibia, Bangladesh, or the Marshall Islands. Children should not suffer hunger.

In the last thousand years the human race has not done a very good job of staving off hunger for its people, yet we have the means to produce food. Where we have done perhaps the worst job is in the dissemination of food. Places and regions have had their droughts and blights while neighbors are not able to help, because of selfishness, or a myriad of other reasons, like poor leadership that allows its people to die while those in power hold on to their own control, like the modern day North Korea or Somalia or a dozen or more other African nations. Syria has seen the same issues because of war recently, as well as Yemen.

War.

Feast or famine, war is another area where there would be a lot less of it in a perfect world.

Violence in general would be, should be, so much less.

Why are so many people getting killed in Chicago this year? It's 2016. The current president hails from Chicago. I call that a mini-war.

Some talk about a war on poverty, a war on drugs. I think there ought to be a war on war, starting with stopping the motivations that make people want to kill other people.

Killing is bad, and in a perfect world it would be reduced, from the big wars down to the smallest potentially deadly conflicts, like gang violence. Or ethnic groups being systematically targeted and oppressed, or gassed, or buried in mass graves, or suppressed in their languages or movements.

What about the Kurds? In a perfect world, we wouldn't necessarily have a Kurdistan, but Kurds would peacefully cohabitate in their homelands, and we would not have to worry about them getting massacred, be they Sunni or Shia or Yazidi or Shabak.

Religions and languages should not be reasons to kill or unfairly discriminate.

And yet, we do.

Do we blame religion? Superstition? Ideologies? Governments?

I blame: us. People.

In a perfect world, we would be people, human, and we would protect and sustain life. We would not use every system and organization to take advantage and exploit people. Or exploit the weakness of others. We would give and protect.

We would be kinder, more generous, and abhor those that prey on the weak.

It all starts with each waking decision we make.
 

Top Twelve Things About You Know Who

 Top Twelve Things About You Know Who

1. When I first met her, she had me at ... whatever she said, that I cannot quite remember, (maybe she can, I can make an educated guess), but suffice it say, whatever she was selling I was buying. Check, please!

2. The last time I ever see her in this life, I'm pretty sure she will smile and cry and be one happy wet mess. And I like that. Not a great thought, really, but better than a smirk or a dismissing sigh.

3.  I was glad to know some of her large family before meeting her, because I kind of felt like Moses exiled in Moab, surrounded by a bunch of young gigglers at the well. You know, the one with all the goats and the thugs when Moses was parched after crossing the Sinai. And then of course she showed up, and it was immediately obvious who Charlton Heston was gonna fall for. Obvious. God and Cecil B. DeMille know how to direct, and all I need to do is follow the script. Thank you God and Mr. DeMille. Great casting!

4. She cooks really well, and not only does she cook, bake, and assemble food items in great quality, but she has an incredible talent for consistently producing more good eats, when maybe some tables and fridges would be running bare. I've never feared hunger in my house. Or even at my work. She can pack food, too!

5. She has cute things all over, but I don't want to embarrass anyone about the details, especially minors, elders, those of mixed company and the 7th fleet of the U.S. Navy. Enough to make a sailor blush! I guess I can surmise it with: I love her all over. Take her toes, for examples ...

6. She is pleased with gestures from me and others, large and small. At the end of the day I am not sure how big of gestures I can come up with, so I am reasonably confident that I have to bet on keeping her with any gestures, even if they don't add up to too much. But with her, it seems like the thought counts.

7. Reason number seven, rhymes with leaven, one word: heaven.

8. She is talented musically and a really good singer.

9. She speaks Spanish and compelled me to go back to one of my favorite second countries, where we stayed for six months. Great memories, a lot of people cannot claim to have done something like that. All that after actively attending a Spanish speaking congregation in the US for two years!

10. Numbers 8 and 9 were prerequisites that I had right after my mission at age 21. By the time I was 28 or so and still very single, I had given up on those dreams of a future mate, being fluent in Spanish and good at music. However, this lady made all my dreams come true!

11. I had another pre-requisite or two of a future spouse when I was a newly returned missionary from South America: she had to be nice and she had to like me. So far, I think we're good.

12.  She is the mother of some pretty awesome kids, and she follows up  with them. I have never seen or heard of anyone better. I'll go with my pick.

13. Yeah, she's worth 13 on a list of top twelve.

#45, Presidents Come and Go

The Donald. The Ego.

He did it. Surprising. Shocking.

Wow, America.

The United States, a continual experiment going global. Well into the 21st century, some 15 years into our Long War, the Global War on Terror.

And it still is about the economy, Stupid.

On our 45th try, after more than 200 years, we picked a guy who had never held public office or served in the military. But he learned the Art of the Deal. And has some New York attitude.

We chose him over a very experienced first time ever female presidential candidate, former first lady, Senator, Secretary of State. Hmm. We are different than our forefathers for sure.

I think he is older than any candidate ever. But he is pretty tough and in good shape.

So far. Let's check a couple years from now.

So the experiment continues.Four more years.

Generations of Cubs Fans: Tonight might be the Time

 I watched the Cubs as a kid in the 1970s because there didn't seem to be much else to watch during the day in the summer. And we only had about 12 channels, and WGN was a big one. I watched the excitement of the 1984 team that made the playoffs with all the memorable nicknames: the Bull, the Penguin, the Sergeant, and the Hall of Famer Ryne Sandberg, ace Rick Sutckiffe, Haray Caray favorite Jody Davis....
Again in 1989, it wasn't meant to be. I was a hard core Expo fan by then, but if not my Montreal Expos, why not the good ole' Cubs? Sammy Sosa hit his hundreds of homers in the 1990s, but to no avail. 

Could this be real? Does a 5 year-old from Illinois exist somewhere on the earth, who would now be 103? Could a living person remember? Certainly the geriatric have memories of their parents and grandparents who talk about it. The 1908 World Champions.

Ahh, the nostalgia and wonder...

Generations of Cubs Fans: Tonight might be the Time

Hope springs eternal for Cub fans. There's always next year...

Those Lovable losers! Who needs to win championships? This is a pastoral game to be enjoyed.

Cubs fans like the game, win or lose. Purists.

"Let's play two!" said Mr. Cub Ernie Banks, a great player who never made the World Series with the Cubs, mostly in the 1960s, long before Wrigley Field adopted lights for night games.

The park and city and club was for purists. And decade after decade, generation after generation, for losers.

Bartman proved it in 2003.

The Curse of the Goat was real.

So tonight?

Could all that futility end?

It ... just... might.

And history will end. The Mayan calendar was four years off.

Or ... the Indians will do it for the first time since 1948.

Not bad for baseball , either way.

Let's play two!

Win one.

Game 7, it's all in the 9 or so innings tonight.

1908. Was it Teddy Roosevelt back then? How many Americans had radios?

2016.

Get ready social media, it's your time to shine, win or lose.

Cubs.

Water is for Wimps!

When I was a younger guy, like age 8 or 9 or 10, I thought being tough was cool. 

I was born into a family where my parents and my sisters, at least my oldest sister, were somewhat tough. They were my definition of tough.

My other sister was more girly, not to say my older tougher sister was not also girly as well (meaning not so tough), but she was girly and tough.

And "tough" comes in different sizes and shapes and flavors, obviously.

My dad was a blue collar worker, getting up 5 or sometimes 6 times a week to put on the work boots, usually before the sun rose, going to houses or apartments or stores or warehouses that did not have heating or air conditioning, depending on the season,  and spending hours upon hours drilling holes, pulling heavy wires through those holes, nailing in outlets and switch boxes throughout the walls, basements, ceilings, and attics, sometimes as carpenters pounded their hammers and ran their incredibly loud electric saws, and then sometimes my dad and his partners would run saws and other trickily pain-inducing tools that could gash, smash, mash, or even electrocute you. Beyond the stifling new and old chambers of sweat and occasional blood and bruises, there was the mud. Boots were necessary for protection from the rain and mud, and cold and snow, and simply unforgiving parts of new construction that would grind your toes and feet into gashed objects or smooshed victims underneath your hopefully comfortable socks.

And don't forget the dangers of heights.  Almost every foundation of every new house and construction sight poses some kind of danger of slipping and falling, when dark or light, dry or wet, hot or freezing cold; some foundations with their deep basements have high 2 x 4 planks and makeshift catwalks that lead across mud embankments straddling crevasses of deep entrenched pools of mud, cement bases, gouging metal pipes or cinder blocks and their deadly re-bars. Dad could slip and fall, and sometimes wooden planks gave way as easy as the balanced footing of an everyday electrician.

Dad wasn't into camping or hunting or fishing: he was into survival. There was always more sweat than mud, always more mud and dirt and grime than blood, always more blood than tears, and at the end of the weeks and months there was always checks paying the bills.

I call that tough for three straight years. After three decades, that's even tougher.

The fact that he spent 4 years in the military learning many aspects of the trade, and also spent over two years in an impoverished jungle of West Africa added to the persona, the lore.

Dad liked Clint Eastwood and Charles Bronson movies. Tough guys.

I think it took some of the edge off of a tough living, a tough work environment. Church probably helped, too.

Dad had plenty of soft sides. We all do. But I think a lot of people looked at him for his exterior, which was tough. Hard working, coarse hands, dirty work boots, that was my dad.


Mom had her own toughness. She had come up from a humble home in New England where her family was the charity case at school, she survived a tour of West Africa as a nurse, raised us kids decently, helped another dozen foster kids over the course of 5 years.

I saw her temper and fight a few times, sometimes when chasing down young snow ball throwers who had pegged our car. She could be scary when chasing some punks in her car! My mom could be tough and spunky, obviously with a tender heart but at times some rough edges. She, like many mothers, had a toughness that could be felt through actions and words.

Most nurses have to be tough, right?

My oldest sister was tough; by the time she got to high school she possessed some tough qualities of both of our parents, and a few of her own. She was four grades older than me, and despite me being rough and rumble at times with my other older sister two grades my superior, I learned at a young age to avoid any confrontations with the oldest. Like my dad, or my mom, or as I think of my mother's mom, Grandpa Nellie, she could definitely manifest a mean streak. Or, perhaps just not putting up with the shenanigans of a four-year old, or an 8 year-old, or a 12 year-old little brother.

I watched some war movies with my dad, watched cowboy and boxing films, James Bond and Star Wars and Superman, and Indiana Jones. Movies for men, tough dudes, hombres of strength and cunning. They were tough.

Tarzan the Apeman, Conan the Barbarian, Buck Rodgers of the 25th century, the Bionic Man, even real life men such as George Washington or Abe Lincoln, two American political icons, but prior to that they were tough fighter types.

The cool guy was tough. From my scriptures, there was David and other strong Bible heroes, John the Baptist and Jesus, and certainly Peter and Paul were not wall flowers; while the Book of Mormon had plenty of others, starting with Nephi but tracing through Abinadi, Ammon, Teancum, Nephi and Lehi, Mormon and his son Moroni. Modern day prophets of the LDS Church were tough men, especially the first two, Joseph Smith and Brigham Young.

The Church has a college football team with big burly men for a reason, too.

And then there are the American Indian icons that I devoured in elementary school:

Pontiac, Crazy Horse, Massassoit, Seneca, Chief Joseph, Red Cloud, Tecumseh, Oceola, on and on. These were men who led in battles and would say to each other serenely:

"This is a good day to die!"

That rang true with me as a child. Those American Indian legends were tough. They were cool.

Tough. Cool. Strong. Sweet.

Warriors. Fighters. Tough guys and rogues, commandos and legends.

Stoic and at times laconic, with a few exceptions; they put up with pain. They did heroic things.

When I was 8 and 9 and 10 years old, that's how I fancied myself. A tough kid. Not mean, not cruel, but a toughie. Or at least, strong.

I would play outside with my friends or alone, and we would play war. We would play in the ice and the snow, or in the extreme heat. We would dig up trenches in the dirt and climb trees and make rope swings and fight off known and unknown enemies from every war knowable.

In real life I valued my "toughness": my ability to run fast or  climb a tree with my strength and ingenuity, to run with a football through or around my cohorts, escaping the overwhelming force of bodies pulling me down. To be able to swim fast and stay under water long, to be able to take on a bully threatening others at school or wherever, a boy ready to pummel a home intruder when the occasion arose. Or a cosmic invader, whichever came first. Step right up and meet my wrath, buster!

Like Clint Eastwood, I considered myself somewhat of an enforcer. I did not look for fights but I looked to end them. In my thoughts, anyway.

One sunny clear day I remember crossing the park across the street from my home with my friends, we a band of intrepid soldiers following our marching orders, battling the forces of evil with our stick guns and faux grenades. In the middle of Bryan Park you are closer to trees and the running water of the creek than any dwelling, separated from reality by a collective imagination of derring-do, bravery, heroism, and toughness. One of my buddies that I always respected and thought highly of asked if we could pass by my house, which was closest, and get some drinking water.

I told him, like the tough wanna-be hardened sergeant of World War II, "Water is for wimps! Tough guys don't need water to drink. That is just being weak, drinking water. Water? You need water? Ha!!"

And thus were some of the 1970s for me, a boy who would learn other versions of tough, later on in life, and most of them did require that precious elixir: water.

But back then, as a child, I fancied I knew what tough looked like, or felt like.

Who needed water? Comfort for a parched throat or overheated body?

Nah. Water is just weakness entering the body.

Being tough? You are beyond the elements, you suffer day after day, struggle for that crazy lifestyle of blood, sweat, and tears. You live like a hero on the silver screen, but you don't talk a big game.

And you don't ask for water.

You only ask for the opportunity to be the silent, cool, tough guy who saves the day.

You don't need help. You are the help.

Life was simpler back then. Life wasn't as tough.

Indiana Football and the Hoeppners--Losing and Victory

Indiana football has had a couple of good runs on the grid iron, ever. Success  happens sporadically and mostly very many years between good runs, even decades apart.

For example, way back around 1945 I have read that the football Hoosiers had a great run and won the Big Ten. I don't know if they were playing the best teams of the best generation of yesteryear, like Army and Notre Dame and Oklahoma, or probably Harvard and Yale back then, but they did well. They did not go to the Rose Bowl, probably, because of a little thing called World War II. Details.

I am not trying to be to glib or cynical, but Indiana's football luck is affected by stuff like world wars. And not in good ways, usually. Stuff external to Indiana University and the play on the field can negatively affect the program. Some people call it snake-bit: when you have observed the Indiana football teams as much as I have, you call it life. And life can be very perplexing and vexing, or if you hang some hopes on the football Hoosiers, anyway.

Sometimes Indiana football is another term for "losing". We hate that, when it comes down to a crucial winning or losing play, or season defining game, and we predictably or inevitably come up short. There have been campaigns where on the final game of the year, the phrase "that dropped pass in the end zone to IU's most reliable and prolific receiver, falling from his hands after properly  finding him in the chest, perfectly targeted from the much maligned journeyman quarterback, has cost Indiana another bowl season." And it usually has been over a decade since they last went to any bowl.

The first football season that my parents moved to Bloomington, in 1967, the "Cardiac Kid" Hoosiers won the Big Ten and traveled to the Rose Bowl, losing to superstar O.J. Simpson and the USC Trojans in the Coliseum. They didn't lose by too much, but they lost.

This is Indiana. Never been back since. Indiana doesn't really play well enough for the Rose Bowl.

Over a decade later future ESPN College Football commentator Lee Corso lead the upstart Hoosiers to the Holiday Bowl in 1979 and miraculously won. One hit wonder against an undefeated smaller school but up-and-coming Brigham Young University, a school I would later to grow to love myself.

And BYU would do things like go on to win for decades. A lot.

But this story is about IU, so back to the losing traditions...

However, it was not all losing. A coach named Bill Mallory brought a period of sustained hope, when the Hoosiers went to six bowl games in a span of eight years, from 1986 to 1994. I was young and impressionable, and I really thought that Indiana had found its presence as a winner in college football. We beat Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State... We even beat South Carolina and Baylor in bowl victories. But not for long.

Mallory had a weak stretch thereafter, was dismissed, and then came a string of coaches that could not do it. Well, the third coach was finally doing it, Terry Hoeppner, but along the lines of IU football luck, he was stricken with a brain cancer that initially removed him from some games and then removed him from the game of life. His successor, based on Hoeppner's recruits and his widow's hopes and inspiration, Bill Lynch, led them to one bowl, the first in 14 years, where they were blown out and would not return with him. Because the real revamp coach was taken by an act of God, an infliction known as cancer.

We IU fans get that. We even know a lot about losing in basketball, a sport that IU has dominated in. But football is different. We know about losing on and off the fields of life. We lose consistently. We have been beaten every way possible. Multiple times. In a single year. And then there's next year!

Lynch tried hard. And then we got an assistant coach from Oklahoma 6 years ago. He was dedicated and he knew it would take a while to win. It took more years than I thought, but we got a winner now.

Many games  were lost in typical fashion, dropped passes, blown plays, poor defense every year.

We lost a close bowl game last December (2015); this year we gave one up to Wake Forest before upsetting Michigan State. Despite succumbing to Ohio State, as expected, there are 7 games left and some fun to be had. Expect the Hoosiers to play in another bowl this December.

I think the corner has been turned.

But alas, life is so often cruel and harsh! That Coach Hoeppner who died while resurrecting their last bowl season while painfully absent in his grave in 2007, his heroic widow graciously taking the playing field with his players as they qualified by a game-winning field goal on the last night of the regular season? Their daughter, 9 years later, in her 40s, died suddenly in a car crash on the main highway outside of Bloomington a few short weeks ago. We mourn for Mrs. Hoeppner and her family. We are sorry that life has been so hard for someone whose family toiled and sweat for Indiana University and left us early.

The current coach, the new hope of Indiana football Wilson, knew Terry Hoeppner, coached with him at Miami of Ohio decades ago. Somehow I think that Wilson knows what he is doing. He is bring a battered fan base to life.

There is hope. There is life beyond death, joy beyond despair, winning after decades of losing.

And past the real life losses of our heroes in the greater world, like Ernie Pyle in World War II, the guns at Memorial Stadium in southern Indiana can hail our grid iron athletes and its school--

and victory.