Looking into Each Other's Eyes: Violence, Sport, and Home

I like football. It's not my favorite sport. I much prefer baseball because it is more nuanced in its play, the strategy more evident, the competitive match-ups right out there for all to behold. And, most of all, I like it because you can see the player's eyes.

I never played football, so I don't know what it's like "in the trenches." That's where they say the game is won or lost. It is where men weighing about 300 pounds play smash mouth, pounding each other to the turf, grabbing each other illegally and avoiding a penalty almost every play. It is where vicious, hard-hitting linemen vie against each other, striving to open a hole in the line where the fleet-of-foot back can gracefully dance through and run for daylight. Or it is where those lineman hold off the incoming defenders to give the quarterback time to launch the perfect spiral downfield to the streaking receiver. It can be beautiful or brutal. It can be elegant or awful. And, helmets and masks being what they are, you can rarely see the player's eyes.

We should make no mistake about the current debate over domestic violence and the National
Football League. This is not fundamentally about football and its violent play. It is not about forms of corporal punishment appropriate for disciplining children (although I don't want to hear a single argument defending punishments that leave welts on the backs of four-year old children). It is not about the vastly underreported culture of violence inside the homes of America. It is not about the simmering climate of distrust in our urban centers where teenagers live in fear of those sworn to protect them.

All of these are in the mix, of course, but none of this will be addressed until we look each other in the eyes and start being honest about our violent society.

Derek Jeter Day

I was glad to watch from the comfort of my home as Derek Jeter was honored at Yankee Stadium yesterday. He has been a fine player and he is a fine human being. I was glad to see the assemblage of athletes and celebrities who turned out to recognize him. I was glad to see him get a base hit on his first at bat. I was glad to hear the roar of the crowd who had watched him play his entire career in Yankee pinstripes. 

And most of all, I was glad to see my Kansas City Royals recognize Jeter by pasting the Yankees 2-0, and continuing their march to a playoffs that could very well include the Royals and exclude the Yankees. Now there is something to celebrate, eh Derek?

From Free Libraries to Free Birth Control: The Stranglehold of Rigid Literalism

Spencer Collins, 9, stands in front of his Little Free Library before leaders
of his hometown of Leawood, Kansas, shut him down.

An updated and somewhat expanded version of this post appears on Medium.com.

Perhaps you've heard the story of Spencer Collins, the nine-year-old boy who got crossways with the civil authorities when he erected a "Little Free Library" in the front yard of his home. It seems that the city codes in the plush suburban environs of Leawood, Kansas, prohibit structures that are not attached to the primary residence--things like tool sheds, side-buildings, detached garages, and such. They don't specify free lending libraries operated by nine-year-old kids, but clearly it's the same kind of crime.

The gravity of his offense did not occur to Spencer when the avid reader built his roadside stand as a Mother's Day gift. He figured that the love of reading instilled in him by his mother could be shared with other kids in his neighborhood. So imagine the surprise of Spencer, not to mention his parents, when they returned from vacation and found an official-looking letter providing a few days to dismantle the library or face a citation and attendant penalties.

The issue with the city officials isn't content; no books on evolution or other insidious topics deplored by many Kansans are to be found here. It isn't a matter of licensing businesses; this isn't a blood-sucking, profit-making enterprise like a lemonade stand or its ilk. No, the sole issue here is consistency in enforcing laws and codes. If you make an exception for a kid the next thing you know some developer will be running an outlet mall in his backyard. Enforce the law!  Who can argue with that?

I'd like to give it a try.

Mortality and Other Annoyances: When the Body Speaks the Soul Listens

This is a substantially revised version of a piece I posted on this blog on March 14, 2012. It is published simultaneously on Medium.com, an interesting new venture in blogging. 

They tell me that I’m going through the “aging process.” I always thought of that as something that can be fixed with a pad of steel wool and a can of Rust-Oleum. I’m now informed that it is far more cosmic than that—something I had begun to suspect a few years ago after a round of doctors appointments to check on a few maladies of seeming little consequence.

What I discovered is that the “aging process” is a default disease. Floaters in your eye? Just part of the aging process. Ringing in your ear? Yeah, that just goes with age. Bladder not fulfilling its part of the deal? Growing old has its issues.

The thing is that while there may be a default diagnosis there is no default treatment. While I am a reluctant pill popper, I figured that surely something as universal as this “aging process disease” could be annihilated by a fat pill, pink in color, with letters like 6YTK inscribed on them. Far from it. Turns out that everything requires a different pill and each one costs something like $357.62, unless you inquire about a generic version, in which case it costs $4.98. Glad I asked.

I’m starting to get annoyed, however. It’s the little things. I’m always happy to get those 10% senior discounts; my longstanding reputation as a good steward (which my kids translate as “cheap”) overcomes admitting that I am old enough to be worthy of this act of benevolence on the part of the local merchants. But just once it would be good to have them inquire as to my eligibility rather than have it assumed. I want to be carded when ordering Denny’s Grand Slam Breakfast.

It may be that part of this is punishment from beyond. I used to travel a lot and that put me sitting across many hundreds of tables accompanied by many more hundreds of people, often seniors. Most of these dear folk seemed able to talk only about the side effects of their various prescriptions, the bedside manner of their physicians, and the latest Medicare loophole to exploit. I know my eyes glazed over. I know I muttered silently something to the effect of “Dear God, why me? Why oh why me?” I’m now wondering if this is the Affordable Health Care version of the Myth of Sisyphus, whereby one is sentenced for all eternity to push a Tylenol up a long hill with the tip of his nose, only to reach the peak and watch helplessly as it rolls back down again.

An Unexpected Book: Discovering My Life's Journey on My Bookshelves

A few days ago my friend Jerry sent me an unexpected book. When I opened my mailbox I saw the familiar Amazon logo but I knew no order was pending. If I have a book coming I listen for the sound of the Postal Service or UPS truck. I know the rhythm of their schedules, can discern the difference between the strained roar of the furniture truck and the contented whirr of the book delivery vehicle. If the books arrive early, as happened a few weeks ago when my free two-day delivery item arrived in one day, I am taken back, ill-prepared, and restlessly pleased. And when they’re late? Well, I mutter and sputter and try to decide who gets my frustration. Usually, the cat.

When I opened the package I was still a bit confused. I didn’t immediately recognize the book nor identify the sender. But after a little reflection I figured it out. A nice lunch with Jerry and Cyndi just a few days before—it had been a long time and they were in town briefly. A conversation about baseball, a favorite topic. Jerry’s inquiry about whether I had read a certain book; I hadn’t, nor had I heard of it. And Jerry, being Jerry, deciding I needed the experience. He liked it, so surely I would. Hence, the unexpected book. I have been thinking about why it delighted me so.