Go Figure

NASA’s chief has revealed a shocking new outlook on extraterrestrial life, saying Mars could hold proof that we are not alone.

Jared Isaacman sat down with conservative political commentator Benny Johnson, where he said: 'If we can get to Mars and bring samples back, I put it at a better 90 percent chance that we could prove there was some microbial life on Mars. (UK Daily Mail)

In reading the above info a thought ran through my mind. People will get all excited about possible microbial life on a distant planet. It's a sign that we're not alone in the universe so, beam me up, Scotty. But if these same people were to be asked about microbial life in a woman's uterus then it's only a clump cells. Go figure.

How Did We Go From Phooey To F*ck

 In 1987 I was a high school basketball coach in Illinois. I don't know kids are today when it comes to manners, but I do think when it comes to civil discourse we've deteriorated.

During one game one of our players became totally disgusted with how the team was not playing defense. One of the referees call a foul on one of his team members and the kid, Derrick, said out loud, "Our defense sucks" and one of the referees immediately whistled him for a technical foul for using bad language.

Times have changed, haven't they? It seems as though one of our political parties is now using the F word as standard operating procedure. As an example:

A Democrat congresswoman is in hot water after making a profanity laced rant on X about President Trump’s recent appearance to the Supreme Court as Justices have oral arguments on birthright citizenship.

Democrat Rep. Susie Lee of Nevada wrote, “I’ll pray they f*ck him to his face. Sorry, I say f*ck a lot these days.”

Need I go on?

Predestination Is Live And Well

 For some reason, now that I'm an octogenarian, I've noticed I've been reflecting a great deal on situations and people from my distant past. It's like my life is flashing before me nonstop. For example, last week I thought about Mr. and Mrs. Gorey. They were an elderly couple who lived across the street from our Clinton Street home. I have no idea how or why they crawled into my brain since it was 1951 and I was five years of age. Or, I recalled the time my Grandpa and I were driving around Boone(Iowa) and he asked me if I wanted a candy bar so we stopped into a grocery store and I purchased a Smooth Sailin' for a nickel. It was a popular bar at the time.

I've also been thinking a great deal about life experiences for which there is not a simple explanation and that they were preordained. Please understand I'm a firm believer that God controls aspects of our lives that have been planned out for us. These are the ones with life shattering results that have long range ramifications; ones that can change our lives for better or worse and if I can't prove this, I can surely give you pause because it's Twilight Zone stuff.

It was May of 1964 and a group of my buddies, five in all, decided we'd drive from our hometown and see a movie in Des Moines which was an hour away. The film was titled 'A Shot In The Dark' starring Peter Sellers and Elke Sommer. Since we'd previously seen Sellers first comedy, 'The Pink Panther', we just knew this would also be a comedic hit. So, we headed out for the Ingersoll Theater and upon arrival we told the film began at 3 pm instead of 1:30. This meant we had to goof around to kill time. As it was, we drove a couple miles and stopped on Grand Avenue which happened to be a major street in that City. It was lined with big Elm trees and magnificent homes built in the post-Civil War period.  If you don't know, because you're too young, the Elm was about to disappear due to a disease but that's another story. Anyway, we happened to park the car and strolled up to four businesses on that street. One was a women's dress shop. Another a candy store. As I said, we were trying to kill time. I happened to be standing next to Steve, a friend, and as we stared through the windows for no apparent reason, I said, "Steve, I just had the weirdest feeling. The girl I'm going to marry lives real close to here." I ask you, what dorky eighteen-year-old would come up with such a thing? I mean, the most important part of my life up to that time was making sure I wore clean underwear. What kid in his right mind would utter such a thing. I don't recall what Steve said in response but I'm sure it was something along the lives of "Oh, shut up." In those days we didn't say STFU!

Let's fast forward to 1969. I was a high school teacher and always on the lookout for weekend activities. Besides, the school in which I taught had 600 people. It was sort of impossible to buy a beer at the local tavern without everyone, including the school principal's dog knowing about it. I had a buddy who was in his senior year at Iowa State. He was in a fraternity and on weekends there were always parties where we could go insane and make fools of ourselves. At one of these functions, I met a coed and I was immediately smitten. We dated for one month and I just knew she was going to be my forever partner. Surprisingly, she felt the same so much so that she invited me to go to her hometown and meet her parents who happened to live in Des Moines. This was a big deal for me to meet her mom and dad and all that jazz. When we pulled into the driveway of her home it hit me square between the eyes and the shocking part is I had not once remembered what I told Steve five years earlier until that moment. The shocker is this. My gal, the love of my life, lived exactly two blocks from the stores on Grand Avenue. Hold onto your shorts because directly across the street from those same stores was St. Augustin's Catholic Church. If you haven't figured it out by now that church was where we were married. As Paul Harvey would have said, "And now you know the rest of the story."

Predestination or coincidence? Seriously? For the big moments in life God always has a plan.