I think that God gives each of us the innate ability to know if something is right or not … now, sometimes that ability may run askew. You may choose to blind yourself to the moral reality, but deep down you know it’s not right.
This could lead to many topics … and today I’m choosing college football.
I have loved college football for years. When I was nine years old, we won our first football national championship (“we” being the University of Nebraska). When I was ten years old, we won our second national championship. Then, when I was thirty-three, thirty-four, and thirty-six, we won our third, fourth, and fifth championships. (The 1990’s were great.)
One of the things I really enjoyed about it was that we were playing with a lot of home-grown boys, plus a few very talented “out of towners” who brought in their expertise … I’m thinking Tommie Frazier, for one … what a sensational QB! And he lives in Nebraska now, I believe … anyway, he’s always been a Husker through and through. And Turner Gill. And Irving Fryar. And Mike Rozier. And Ndamukang Suh.
But this football portal thing is destroying the state-built school structure. When Coach Sanders goes into Colorado and portals in an entire (almost) team with new folks who didn’t grow up with each other and who hadn’t played together and whose names didn’t have nearly unpronounceable strings that end in WCYJIVXY (just kidding about that one), it’s hard to believe that the team will feel united, where they go all out for each other because they’re playing as one team.
I admit that I could be totally wrong about them. Maybe Sanders has a GREAT idea and maybe it’s the way to go. I’ve got to complain, though, because it’s possible they”ll kill us tomorrow (Saturday. CU *does* have amazingly talented players, including the coach’s son as QB.)
Anyway, good luck to you tomorrows, CU. I hope it’s a close game, like in the old days. We had some great games for the fans to watch. Personally, I’m hoping the Huskers can come in and catch you off guard. We haven’t seen much of you — just that first game last week. Then again, you haven’t seen much of us. Will the “old rivalry” factor play a part? Perhaps. I (think) I hope so.
Best to all. Let’s have a great game!
Go Huskers!
Some of you are transferring to get more playing time … some of you are transferring to get more money with your valuable image and notoriety. Those aren’t necessarily bad things on an individual basis, but it seems to be changing the game to be all about money.
Maybe it’s been all about money (for you guys) for a long time. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, I was naive to all that. I believed in the game for the game’s sake. It was an honest (it seemed) system, the games were hard-fought, smash-mouth, may-the-best-team-win kinds of affairs. Did you see the Nebraska – Minnesota game last weekend? What a game! Minnesota won the hard-fought contest in the waning moments of the game with a field goal. There are a few transfer portal players on each team, but not a whole heck of a lot. And it’s okay if we get more. But I certainly wouldn’t advocate dropping an entire team (which is almost what Colorado has done) and repopulating it with transfers. That’s like saying you can skip Aunt Ruth’s corned beef hash and go directly to the tira misu. Not healthy, not smart.
Who wants to play on a team where you haven’t grown up together, where you haven’t melded together as a team. You haven’t lived through the lean times.
Maybe it’s better this way. Maybe it’s the new culture. I don’t have to like it though. I was thirty-three once. Then I blinked, and suddenly I’m sixty-two. I don’t know how that happened. Maybe I stumbled on Life’s Great Portal. Perhaps Parkinson’s Disease is that Great Transfer Portal in the Sky. After all, it did grant me early access to walkers and wheel chairs. Yee ha! Okay, now I’m just being silly.
I tell you, adversity does indeed give you an edge. You learn to handle things. You learn to overcome. You learn to deal with it.
The Adventures of John Stevens, Jr., My Great-Grandfather
Note: This is mostly fiction, but it has close ties with an actual event. This wil someday be rewritten so that it aligns with the facts. Until then …
An Untold Story I was blessed to have a great-grandfather who recorded countless notes, wrote numerous letters, and told fascinating stories. He also compiled myriad fictional tales (humorous and/or romantic), poems, and other writings. One of his most notable works was a history of early Arapahoe (named, coincidentally enough, “Early Arapahoe”), through which he described and defined, or redefined, the ambient culture and mini-biographies of the founders of the town and surrounding county in that era. My great-grandfather, John Stevens Jr. (or Johnny, as he is referred to in my books), was a bit of a renaissance man. He was a farmer and he, with his brother George, managed a farm that yielded about forty acres of corn each summer. He and George also owned a small corral of horses, and Johnny became an expert horseman, even able to stand on two horses walking abreast, one of his legs on one horse and his other leg on the second horse. Indeed, he was a showman who was confident and who enjoyed sharing his skills and “horse abilities” with the local community. A couple of times, he even performed at the annual state fair in Lincoln. A remarkable marksman, Johnny almost single-handedly put Arapahoe at the top of the state’s marksmanship rankings. He could fire two pistols at once with the accuracy of the best one-pistol shooters. Johnny became the assistant editor of a weekly newspaper, the Edison Echo (Edison was a community that extended out from the northeast corner of Arapahoe and eventually became its own township). Johnny would write the obituaries and op/ed articles on various issues, mostly political and often in a humorous vein. He opposed the policies coming out of Washington, and his writing was influential enough to make Furnas County the only county in the 1936 election to not support FDR. Enjoying the legal aspects of government, Johnny began studying law, and he interned with a popular attorney in nearby Beaver City, a man by the name of Frank Morrisey. This internship was a valuable academic experience for Johnny, and it provided cheap labor for Morrisey. Morrisey developed a fondness for Johnny, and he handed Johnny all the legal exposure necessary to give him a solid foundation in law. After a couple of years, Mr. Morrisey told Johnny, “I think you’re ready for the bar”—that is, the Bar exam that one was required to pass to become a legal state attorney. Johnny took a couple of courses in Nebraska’s Law School in Lincoln to polish his rough edges, and then he passed the Bar in his first attempt. He had become an attorney! Almost coincidentally, Johnny’s next older brother Ott (nickname for Oscar) had become the sheriff—the man wearing the star—of Arapahoe. The 1880s were nearly as wild as the 1870s had been, and law enforcement (sheriffs like the Masterson brothers (Bat and Ed) and deputy Wyatt Earp, in Dodge City,) and villains like Jesse James, Belle Starr, and Cole Younger, kept each other busy. Even though the concept of trial by jury had been in use for hundreds of years and was laid out in the U.S. Constitution, this structure of righteous judgment was sometimes avoided for expediency’s sake and was replaced with “Frontier justice,” which could include lynch-mob hangings, burnings at the stake, and other forms of execution based solely on mob rule and (perhaps) the evidence at hand. Johnny and his brother Ott were both intent on restoring the order and provision of trial by jury in western Nebraska. Concerned about the long-term safety of his brother in such a risky profession, Johnny built a three-story house in Arapahoe, living on the top floor and renting out the floors below. This allowed him to temporarily move back to Arapahoe from Beaver City for as long as he deemed necessary. The house was four houses down the street from the sheriff ’s office and jail on the opposite corner. Now, what am I doing? I’ve been tellin’ the story, but I ain’t been SHOWIN’ the story. What’s the mantra—something like, “Show, don’t tell.” Here we go.
“Stevens,” snarled Fitz Cook, bursting through the saloon doors, “you ain’t got a bone in your body that ain’t a’feared of me. You’re scared of me jumpin’ out from behind that big cottonwood over by your place; you’re scared ‘cause you know ‘twas wrong to steal my girl; and very, very soon you’ll be scared of my gun, ‘cause you know it’s aimin’ right at you.” Ott Stevens, Johnny’s brother, remained silent, sitting at the bar with his back to the doors that were still swingin’. He didn’t respond, nor did he turn around. He didn’t have to answer to swine like Fitz Cook. “Sheriff Stevens!” shouted Cook. “Ya didn’t hear what I said? Listen to me. You’re a spineless piece of trash. When vultures pluck out the eyes of your dead body, it’ll be better than you deserve.” “Cook!” shouted Marvin Wyrick, owner and proprietor of Wyrick’s Saloon as he stepped out from behind the bar. “Get out of here. We ain’t got no room for fightin’ in my ’stablishment.” “Wyrick,” argued Cook, “this sheriff ain’t worth the dirt on his boots. I’m gonna get you, Stevens, and I’m tellin’ you, it’s gonna happen sooner rather’n later. Watch your six.” As he turned toward the door to leave, two of his henchmen stood up to accompany him. Cook glared at the four or five other men who were sittin’ there. “Any of you get in my way,” he warned, “and you’re next.” Days passed and weeks rolled by. The girl that Ott had stolen from Fitz Cook had then been stolen from Ott by someone else, the twain of whom had skipped town and were somewhere in Missouri, south of Davenport. Late afternoon on a particularly hot day in late August, Ott Stevens was unlocking the front door to the sheriff ’s office, having just returned from dinner at Wyrick’s, when he heard a familiar voice cry out from across the street, “Stevens! Your time has come.” Ott, watching almost in disbelief as Fitz Cook and two of his buddies rushed toward him, pulled his gun just as the mob descended upon him. Two other passersby saw that the sheriff was in trouble and they jumped in to help, brave souls that they were. A fight ensued, arms and fists flying everywhere. Ott was knocked down twice but managed to get upright. BANG! A loud, crisp shot pierced the evening sky, cracking the—well, I was gonna say “‘cracking the silence,” but, even though the fight really wasn’t quiet, the numerous “WHAMs” and “BAMs” and “POWs” and “OOMPHs” were rather muffled and weren’t nearly as sharp-sounding as the gunshot. The gathering crowd quickly backed away as did the those involved in the brawl—everybody but Sheriff Ott and nemesis Fitz Cook. Ott was standing maybe eight or nine feet from the corner street lamp. Cook was on his knees in front of the street lamp. They were staring at each other. Ott, his right arm extending out to his side, was pointing a smoking gun upward. “Sheriff … Sheriff,” gasped Cook, and then he fell forward, dead, bullet hole in his back. Every sort of rumor quickly circulated through the town, creating a heap of questions that would have to be answered in a court of law. As proceedings were set up for the case “State of Nebraska versus Ott Stevens,” the defense attorney was none other than John (Johnny) Stevens, the defendant’s brother. Many, many people from the crowd that had watched the fight were questioned on the witness stand. Ten people gave ten different accounts of what they said had happened. “The sheriff shot him … No, the shot came from another direction and hit Cook in the back … there were two shots … No, it was one shot with an echo … No, it was two shots and an echo.” Ott had remained silent throughout most of the trial. I think he just figured no one would believe him under the circumstances. Most of the testimony of the witnesses was shown to be in conflict, one way or t’other, with reality and thus could be discarded. Fortunately for Ott, one lone trustworthy individual, Dominicus (“Min”) Hasty, said the sequence of events progressed as such:
1) Ott put his gun back in his holster the moment the fight began.
2) As more people were pulled into the fight, Ott drew his gun, raised it and aimed straight upward, and he fired the gun.
3) However, a slight, almost indiscernible moment before Ott fired his gun, another shot rang out from some distance away. The witness was pretty confident that Ott’s shot coincided with the echo of a first shot.
4) Mr. Hasty saw Cook get struck in the back; Cook did not change his position after getting shot. He merely fell forward moments later and died. Ott, standing in front of Cook, could not have shot him in the back.
5) Further, Mr. Hasty pointed out that the bullet removed from Cook’s body was from a Colt 45 revolver, not a 38 caliber that was the smoking gun Ott had fired. Ott was also carrying a 45, but he chose the 38. If he had intended to kill Cook, he likely would have used the more powerful 45.
Defending his brother before judge and jury, Johnny asked three questions of the defendant.
“Ott, why did you fire your pistol.”
“I noticed that more and more people were being pulled into the fight. I wanted to get everyone’s attention—immediately—so that I could tell people enough was enough and we needed to quit this foolish exercise.:
Ott, Mr. Hasty said that when you were being approached by Mr. Cook and his henchmen, you pulled out your gun first but then, almost immediately, you actually put your gun back in the holster. Why did you do that?” “Well, I was worried that I would get angry and shoot the gun without thinking things through. I couldn’t just toss the gun aside, but I could put it away. When I shoot a gun, I want it to be for justice, not from anger.” “You put the gun away so that the people in the fight would be safe.” “Yes sir,” replied Ott humbly. “And you shot the gun into the sky so that the people in the fight might stop fighting, thus keeping them safe?” “Yes sir,” said Ott. “That was my intent.” After a brief pause, Johnny looked at the jury and said, “Now, pay close attention to this.” The alert jury focused every eye on Johnny. “In the coroner’s report it specifies that the bullet’s position relative to the entrance wound was of a severely downward attitude. Specifically, the bullet was fired from somewhere much higher off the ground. To make that shot, you would have had to hold the gun way above your head, maybe even on your tip toes, and then fire downward at a sharp angle.” “Yes sir, I believe that’s right.” “You always were the shortest of us Stevenses.” “Yes, sir.” Johnny smiled. “Ott, thank you, and thank you, jury, and thank you, Your Honor. The Defense rests.” Minutes later, jury returned with the verdict: Not Guilty; the judge concurred. Ott was free. Johnny shook Ott’s hand, and Ott said, in a halting voice, “Thank you, dear brother.” “A free man deserves to be free,” replied Johnny. “Let’s go.” The two men left the court without fanfare. That evening, Johnny returned to his third floor apartment, exhausted from the day’s proceedings. He was pleased with the result. Johnny, out of habit, always paid attention to detail—every detail, maybe even obsessively so. That’s why he was an attorney and a newspaper editor and a farmer. During the trial, one thought kept recurring almost to the point of interrupting his cognitive abilities. When he entered his apartment that night, the thought came to him again: Have I cleaned the gun? He opened his gun safe and there it was, clean and pristine. Breathing a sigh of relief but not being one who took chances, Johnny unfolded his gun cloth, added a drop of gun oil, wiped down the pistol’s barrel and chamber, and then ran a clean cloth through the barrel. Johnny planned to return a clean Colt 45 to the man from whom he had borrowed it “just to try it out.” That man was Min Hasty. The End
During the past few weeks, I have spent a considerable amount of time as part of a team tasked with writing a story to be presented at church. This was part of an extensive effort to determine the strategic spiritual direction of the church (at the local church level).
I worked as hard as I could to make it the best it could be. I viewed this as the most important piece of writing that I have ever done. By the end of the process, I was exhausted. I had used every bit of my energy in helping to develop a twenty to thirty minute presentation. Call it an even thirty minutes, and that is one-half of an hour. In the grand scheme of things, that’s only 1/48th of one day (at least here on Earth, where our days are twenty-four hours). On other planets, your mileage may vary.
My efforts were far from perfect. Consider what the effort level would be to make it absolutely perfect. I can’t conceive that, really. I’m not even sure what perfect really means. For the sake of argument, let’s give that effort a value. Call it P (for Perfect).
Forty-eight of those Ps would be a perfect day; take that new value (48P) and multiply it by 365 days (ignoring leap year) to get 17520P.
(During all this, I’m ignoring the added complexity of ORDER … that is, perhaps it would be more perfect to rearrange the days in a different order … or rearrange the hours in a given day … )
So 17520P is the perfect year for one person. What’s the rating for one person’s perfect year, or perfect lifetime? What’s the rating for EVERYBODY’S perfect lifetimes in total?
The World Health Organization reports that from 2010 – 2013, the average lifespan worldwide is 71.0 years (both genders combined). So for a perfect life, on average, we have 71 times 17520P, or 1,243,920P.
That is per person. Another way to think about this is like this: the average person, worldwide, has over one million two hundred thousand half-hour time slots in his life.
The United States Population Fund reports that on Oct 31, 2011, the global population reached 7 billion. The Population Reference Bureau estimates that 107 billion people have ever lived.
Of course, the average age has varied considerably during the history of mankind. We’ll deal with that later. For now, let’s go with our 71 years.
For 107 billion people with an average age of 71 years, there is a total of 133099440000000000, or 1.3309944E17. For you who care (I do), that’s over 133 quadrillion half-hour time slots. That means 133 quadrillion P are needed to have them all be perfect.
Troubled that I used 71 years as the average age? Fine. Let’s be liberal and say that the average person only lived 35 years. Let’s cut the estimate IN HALF. That’s still over 66 quadrillion P.
The Bible tells us (in Psalms) that God already fore-ordained all our days. God’s grand universal plan is perfect.
Now, consider this. The Bible also tells us in Romans that: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” (ESV)
At this point, I don’t know how to add in the true complexity, because not all of our lives have interacted with every other life that ever lived. But it’s clear that some interaction does go on, things do occur, and lives are impacted by each other. Somehow, God takes those quadrillions of Ps and has them work together to come out according to his plan.
How does that work? I have no idea.
We live in a world of free will. We are not God’s marionettes. I can choose to do within my time slot whatever it is I want to do. The contents of the time slots are up to me. But no matter what I choose, God’s plan will come to fruition, and in the end He will be glorified.
One option is to believe that God set up the world (a clockworks model), wound it up, and is sitting in the parlor watching the cuckoos pass by. That, however, flies in the face of Scripture, from which we learn that: God has a tender heart for the poor, the broken-hearted, widows, orphans, and the sick; God notes when a sparrow falls; God knows how many hairs are on your head; and, most of all, God loves you so much that HE came down and died in your place.
If that’s not enough, consider this: Depending on the source, the estimates for the number of stars in the sky (our galaxy plus all the other (estimated) galaxies) are between 1 sextillion (1E21) and 100 octillion (100E27) stars. That is, somewhere between 1 with 21 zeroes behind it and 1 with 29 zeroes behind it.
Then, consider the following. Isaiah 40:26 tells us: “Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name.” Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.
The Nebraska / Minnesota game Thursday night was a nail-biter and went down to the last play. Huskers lost, 13-10. The Golden Gophers played a tough game and it took NU a while to get the running game going, but by the end of the 3rd quarter we were moving the ball, but near the end of the fourth quarter we fumbled, got the ball back, and threw an INT in the end zone. Minnesota marched downfield and kicked the FG for the win. Husker Jeff Sims looked good at QB, and his scrambling was a great asset for the Huskers. He threw three interceptions, but he also threw bullets into tight spots. NU’s 3-3-5 defense pretty much squashed Minnesota’s running game until near the very end, when one long run set them up in field goal position. The three on Nebraska’s defensive line kept Minnesota’s offensive line busy. The Huskers pass defense allowed several short completions early, but then they buckled down and I think Minnesota only got 2 or 3 receptions longer than 20 yards and nothing long. It was a clean game with very few penalties. And the Minnesota fans seemed nicer (on tv, anyway) than I remember them being. 🙂 Me? I’ll be at a couple Huskers games later in the fall. Looking forward to it. Go Big Red!
Aunt Ruth, America’s favorite grammarian, has officially come out of her period of silence.
“I am not going to pursue joining the Big Ten football conference. I repeat,” she stated over the already stressed sound system, “the Big Ten will remain (Aunt) Ruthless for the 2024 season. I do realize,” she continued, “that the Big Ten remains in the awkward predicament of presiding over seventy-three ( 73) teams, the prime number thus making fair scheduling a nightmare. Not to worry, though. I have come up with a solution — just a simple twist of ARSE encryption algorithms using wedding ring and cow-field theory, and, (of course), a cello to provide some string theory.”
Instead of clearing the air, Miss Aunt Ruth’s statements only obfuscated things and made life smellier, akin to pouring a bottle of Chanel No. 5 on a sweaty pig. “That’s really gross,” she opined. “While we’re at it, I need to emphasize, emphatically and with extreme emphasis, I am not building a barbecue joint in Memphis.” The crowd murmured.
“Finally, just to clear the air, I have NOT signed up with the transfer portal to quarterback at Nebraska, North Carolina, or Notre Dame, but I’ve nailed a permanent gig with Gladys’s Gastroenterology. Thank you.”
This story occurred in western Nebraska in 1878. That was an adventurous time to be living. Lakota Sioux, Northern Cheyenne, and other Indian tribes sometimes encountered white pioneer settlers. Those encounters didn’t always end on a positive note, but sometimes they did, and friendships could grow.
Saving Arapahoe is an action-filled page-turner that will keep you in the chair until you’ve finished.
So, as it were, I found myself wandering the streets of this magnificent northwest city. Why? I was tired but no sleep would come to me. I had been writing a book and I came to a place where the two main threads collided with each other … and exploded to bits. You know, when the train that crossed the country (what’s that called … I’m drawing a blank … oh it’s the Trans-Continental Railway (or approximately that — I asked my cell phone).
Anyway, the insomnia (I couldn’t remember that word either, so I asked my wife and she told me) drove me out of the bedroom and onto the sidewalks so I could burn off some energy and clear my thoughts. Now, midnight in this Pacific northwest population-magnet is not a quiet time. In fact, there is no quiet time in this haven of fish markets and roasted coffee beans.
I heard noises of trucks and cars and construction equipment; sirens and whistles and car horns; marching band horns and drums and crowds yelling and people shouting, cheering, laughing, or jeering; My ears caught the cockle-doodle-doo of the good-morning rooster and the cluck, cluck, cluck of the truthful hens (i.e, they were not lying, they were laying)I heard the cry of a hawk, the bark of a blue heron, and the shrill, familiar screech of the Nebraska Sandhills Crane. I heard dogs and cats, pigs and bats, sheep, goats; I heard horses and donkeys and cows mooing or lowing or whatever they do. As they say, the ox and the ass were noisy too.
Then, like being struck by ten Yamaha tubas and a Steinway piano falling from the sky, it hit me. I heard absolutely no baby chicks. No, not a one.
Gennesaret Press announced Monday the upcoming release of Saving Arapahoe, the third book in the Johnny Stevens Pioneer Adventures series. The setting is western Nebraska in 1878. This 1st-person story is based on letters and stories from the author’s great-grand- father when he was a 12-year-old boy. The Indians and pioneers didn’t always see eye-to-eye, and that led to some harrowing experiences! Even so, great friendships are formed and alliances made. This is a great book for families to read together. Take a look. The book lists at $17.95 and should become available on Aug 15, 2023.
