she was really tall

When I was thinking about Apollo and Walter Cronkite, I also thought about Mrs. McGinn.  She was my second grade teacher.  And then, I checked my local paper and found she died over the weekend.

Some people were meant to teach.  She was one of them.  She encouraged us.  She loved us.  She laughed.  She was bigger than the school.  She was Mrs. McGinn.

She was really tall and she liked the Packers, sort of a power forward who liked sports.  What wasn’t to like?

One project she did every year was hatching chickens in her class.  We’d start with a couple of eggs in a incubator.  Each day we’d come in and check progress wondering when those things would crack open.  Eggs don’t change much when they’re hatching.  And, when the chickens hatched we all went home and asked our parents if we could have a chicken.

Around my high school graduation, I received a letter in the mail.  It was a letter to myself written in the second grade.  I’d completely forgotten I did this.  Mrs. McGinn didn’t.  She remembered me, and every other second grader that went through her class for 30 years.

Growing up, there are people who have a real impact on your life.  Mrs. McGinn was that for me.  Sleep well Mrs. McGinn.

“the Eagle has landed”

Forty years ago I remember exactly where I was when this picture was taken. I was in the family room of my home with my dad sitting in his rocking chair next to me.

I don’t remember this picture in color. I remember it in black and white. That’s the kind of TV we had.

I was 11. For years we’d been watching the Gemini, then Apollo space craft blasting off during classes during school. It was always kind of cool when they’d let you watch TV during school hours.

John Glenn and Wally Schirra were big time heroes, bigger than Mickey Mantle or Bob Gibson. This was dangerous stuff they were doing. People died.

A remarkable feat is even more remarkable knowing now that these guys were flying machines that had less technology than today’s microwave oven. They saddled themselves to rockets like some kind of science fiction cowboys and shot themselves into the sky. But this wasn't science fiction. People died.

Landing on the moon didn’t necessarily give us any more information than we already had. Actually it was kind of a waste of time. It wasn’t about science as much as it was about achieving a goal once thought impossible. It was about fulfilling a promise made eight years earlier.

Before this photo, the moon was a sort of nightlight in the sky. After, it became a place where the earth looked small, an achievement, and a source of wonder. And, isn’t that what it’s supposed to be?

and that’s the way it is……

I always thought if God had a voice, it was Walter Cronkite.  That voice was silenced forever on Friday.

Any words I write would be too shallow, too hollow, too insignificant to underscore the importance of this man who I trusted throughout my youth.

Beginning from the time of my earliest memory, his voice resonated with news of the assassination of JFK to Vietnam to Apollo to Martin Luther King to Woodstock to Watergate to Iran.  He even introduced us and Ed Sullivan to the Beatles.  More recently, he was the voice of experience, of reason.

There were times he wept on the air, and we wept with him.  He was the truth.  He brought perspective.  He was our conscience.

His voice was everywhere.  On Satuday mornings, he was teaching me history on “You Are There” and “The Twentieth Century”. 

I think about my kids when  I think of someone as substantial as Walter Cronkite.  How do I tell them the importance of this man, the man who narrated the “Spaceship Earth” ride at Disney World? 

There is no parallel in society- nobody- not Oprah, not Obama, not Billy Graham.

And now he’s gone.

politically incorrect

If you know me, you know I take no prisoners when it comes to teasing.  And, when I have new material to work with, it can be fun.  So, prior to reading this, understand, I AM TEASING. 

Serjio is a guy who is a partner in a furniture company in Mexico City.  As Latin people go, he is the stereotypical “Latin Lover”.  He likes the ladies.  If you watch his eyes, they focus and dart with the strides of senoritas.  Let’s just say his focus is unfocused.  

So, when he picked me up at the airport yesterday, we were doing the small talk thing when I noticed the eye movement.  He asked me how I liked Mexico.  I told him I liked Mexico fine, but I didn’t like Mexicans.  What?

He looked at me wondering if he heard me correctly.  I stood there like I said nothing, and then cracked a smile.  Then, he laughed. 

Latin men, especially men like Serjio, are very proud, very masculine, and very aware of their masculinity.  These guys are lions. 

Later, at dinner, he asked me if I liked fondue?  I told him it was OK.  And in a very matter-of-fact way, I also told him the gays in the United States liked it, too.  You talk about an uncomfortable few seconds.  And then I smiled.  Laughter.

I figured if it worked for Kathy Griffin, it could work for me.     

Winston tastes good, like a cigarette should

Most people are too young to remember an ad campaign run by RJ Reynolds that touted the flavor of Winston cigarettes with the jingle “Winston tastes good, like a cigarette should”.  In the ad, the announcer corrects the grammar to “Winston tastes good, as a cigarette should”, but then a jingle comes in with the the incorrect grammar again.  It ran for a long time.

Think about that, an ad with grammar as the focus.  Today, it seems, we don’t know the difference.

A while back, I was following this beer truck.  “Traffic.  If only it were as light as your beer.”  Well, traffic were real heavy that day.  If I would have known traffic were going to be that bad, I might have stayed in bed wondering who proof reads these things. 

from the heart

If you’re feeling the least bit cynical, click on the link below.

http://www.nbc.com/americas-got-talent/video/clips/kevin-skinners-performance/1131369/

The embodiment of class, Kevin Skinner taught me something a couple weeks ago on America’s Got Talent. 

When Susan Boyle came on the scene a few months ago, she had a decent voice.  But, it was that it came from THAT person that amazed us.  If that sound had come out of someone who looked the part, we would have never noticed, and she may not have advanced as far as she did.  

This is different.  I’ve watched the video several times.  This guy is good, really good.  It’s not a special training, but the honesty, the honesty of himself, his singing, and the way he lives. 

A guy like him doesn’t sing the music, he lives it, he wears it, he sleeps it, he eats it.

He doesn’t have to impress, because he’s comfortable in his skin.  Like an easy chair, he brings you in and makes you comfortable too.

home

Toto, I’m home!

About 24 hours ago, I put on my ruby slippers and clicked them together, “There’s no place like home.  There’s no place like home.  There’s no place like home,”  I said to myself.

As I landed in Madison, the sky was bluer, the grass was greener, the air was fresher, and all is good.