Black Is Beautiful, But C'mon...

It was with great sadness a few years back when I watched the Atlanta Falcons sidleline their bright red uniforms. The NFL granted much leeway regarding such things and Atlanta had a new coach and he, along with management, apparently decided it was time to "reinvent" themselves. So they benched red in lieu of black.

Atlanta wasn't the first team to don black jerseys. The Chicago Bears have always worn black. They should. They're Bears. And for years the NFL's resident "bad boys" - the Oakland Raiders - wore black. Their notoriety as cheaters (and being very successful while doing so), made the color black a color to be "feared."

Of course all teams are forced to wear white, a a very light colored jersey for their away games. This dates back to the early days of lucrative television deals and since most or all of TV was broadcast in living black and white, it was the way in which teams could be easily distinguishable to viewers in their living rooms. But the colors the teams are known by are the ones on their home jerseys. And more and more they are becoming colorless in the name of macho posturing.

The Denver Broncos were once a lively orange and were even nicknamed the "Orange Crush". Now they've switched to a blue so dark it looks like black at first glance. And recently, following the lead of many teams, the Detroit Lions, laughably, have gone to a black jersey. Along with their standard and beautiful Caribbean Blue, it becomes very unpleasing to the eye. Sorry Detroit, you can't be tough and feared by simply putting on black jerseys. You get that by winning games.

Alas, this ugly trend has even slithered down to the high school ranks. Even the Greenville Yellow Jackets have gone from a once great look to the "go-to-when-you're-out-of-ideas" color black (or a reasonable facsimile thereof). Another victim of a coach's perceived need to "reinvent" a team and possibly desiring a "bad boy" label. I, for one, sure miss the beautiful and very eye pleasing complimentary colors of the purple jersey with the yellow numbers. They are the YellowJackets after all. Maybe the coach should have stopped by one of the most important departments in the school - the art department - before making the decision to opt for boring.

But this is what happens when not enough attention is paid to the arts in school. Today's architects design buildings that are just square boxes. Automobiles today all look alike. And all of the beauty and color, delight and pagentry of football is going dull, colorless, and flat. And we don't even complain.

Hopefully someday this disturbing trend will cycle out and color and a little joy will return to football. I think it should start now. Bring back color to the game and leave the overly dramatic black to Johnny Cash and Darth Vader. They pull it off. But anyone else, as often a not, come off looking like Snidley Whiplash.

When Do You Reckon?

This is a posting that I am going to add to as different words occur to me. See, lately I've been contemplating the fact that we seem to be losing words and misusing others (For example people can often be heard saying they are 'anxious' to do something when in fact they mean 'eager'). But that will be for another time.

RECKON: I occasionally use the word "reckon". Do you reckon?" I might ask. "I reckon we should do that" I might offer. This makes my wife nuts. She thinks this makes me totally hillbilly. She'll always respond with "I dunno, but y'all shore makes me feel purty!" I don't know why we are losing the word 'reckon'. It seems perfectly logical to me and sometimes seems like the only appropriate word for the situation. I'd like to think that I am just trying to perserve the language, but I acknowlege that it may be a case of too much Andy Griffith Show.

SLEET: Another thing that makes me crazy is people saying this stupid phrase "Freezing Rain". Hey, folks we have a word for that. It's called "sleet". This begs the question: When did 'sleet' fall out of favor? Why do people opt for the more bulky 'freezing rain'? Now I know there are those morons out there that will say "Hey, Freezing Rain and "Sleet" are two different things." Oh, really Frank Sleighmaker? Not according to the dictionary. It's sleet. And no, there's no such thing as 'black ice'. There's clear ice on black things.

CRESTFALLEN: When's the last time you were crestfallen? How would you know if you were crestfallen, as opposed to just say, blue. I suppose the "freezing rain' people would prefer the bulkier "down in the dumps." But sometimes I feel downright crestfallen. I can't explain it, I just am. So try to be crestfallen this week. It really feels different. And it'll make you want to save the word.

GAY: The problem with homosexuals having some sort of inferiority complex which does not allow them to embrace the perfectly good word 'homosexual' is that they decided to steal another word from the language, and that word they decided (They must have - I didn't get a vote!) is GAY. Now this is truly too bad, for many reasons, but mostly because we don't have any other word in the lexicon that means exactly what gay means. But we have many words that mean the same thing as Fabulous. So fellas, have a "Fabulous lifestyle" and go to "Fabulous nightclubs" and let us have 'gay' back.

ASTONISH: 'Awesome' is so over worked, that it is losing its potency. Most people blurt 'Awesome!' when they are actually astonished. These are the same people that say they are 'anxious' to do something, when they really mean 'eager'. But I suppose exclaiming "Astonishing!" would draw sidelong glances. Too bad. Astonish is a good word and is too often neglected.

Baby Face

A little tid-bit I recently ran across and was sharing wih my pal, Bill Baker:

In the early 30's Baby Face Nelson decided to get into the Bank Robbing business. On August 18, 1933 he robbed his first bank -the Peoples Savings Bank - in Grand Haven, Michigan. I have a friend that used to live in the area, and according to him the old bank building still stands, although the People's Savings Bank is in a new location.

Ten Must Reads To Understand American Life

Here are ten books that I think are must reads if a person really wants to understand American life. For my money, I think you should have to read all of these in order to qualify to be an American citizen.

1. Look Homeward, Angel. Thomas Wolfe
2. To Kill A Mockingbird. Harper Lee
3. The Grapes of Wrath. John Steinbeck
4. On The Road. Jack Kerouac
5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Mark Twain
6. The Catcher In The Rye. J. D. Salinger
7. Of Mice And Men. John Steinbeck
8. One Flew Over The Cukoo's Nest. Ken Kesey
9. The Great Gatsby. F. Scott Fitzgerald
10. Trout Fishing in America. Richard Brautigan

If you ain't read 'em, read 'em!

Jeff Boughner

I just discovered that my old friend Jeff Boughner passed away the middle of last month. Don't really know the cause yet - it takes a while to get news out here in Sheridan- but rumor has it it was cancer. Jeff was of course a founding member of the 60's Grand Rapids garage band extrodinaire "The Soul Benders" with former radio personality Aris Hampers.

I worked with Jeff on and off at "Flaming Rat Records" which was a record store co-founded by Dave Swart (deceased) and Harry Dieterman (also deceased). Ironically, in later life, Harry Dieterman would become a very close friend of Jeff's brother Lee. But I guess that's another story.

Flaming Rat Records" morphed into "The Rat" after a location change - a change that proved to be it's undoing. But while it was "The Rat" across from Woodland Mall, Jeff and I spent many hours there working together and debating the virtues of this artist or that artist. I am a compulsive list maker so it really was "High Fidelity" come to life. Jeff had a quiet soft-spoken demeanor, but he wasn't a lightweight. He was one of the sharpest guys I've ever met. Got me truly interested in jazz.

Jeff also gave me guitar lessons back in my "Springsteen period". Since I was already a player of no distinction, I would go to the lesson having already told Jeff what song I wanted to learn. He would have it figured out and would take an hour to teach it to me. Imagine my delight when I hit the street and could knock out "Prove It All Night", leads and all. Man, that was fun. It was about then he found out he needed a kidney transplant, and his brother Lee had to give him one of his. I visited Jeff in the hospital then and had to get into a full scrub outfit and had to keep my mouth and nose under one of those masks. Haven't thought about that in years.

After that I would see Jeff as he managed Schuler Books and Music on 28th Street. Again, a quiet demeanor, but with a little prodding we could get into a discussion about the best or worst of this or that. But since I have moved so far from Grand Rapids, I hadn't seen Jeff in a few years. Schuler's won't seem the same. Nor will the Grand Rapids musical landscape.

So long, Jeff.

PS. Little known Jeff Boughner fact: His grandfather was former GR mayor George Welsh, of the Welsh Auditorium fame.

Don't Buy Into Convoluded Thinking

One thing that I hear people say that I find incredibly disturbing is the saying "if you don't vote, you don't have a right to complain." What a bunch of hogwash. So then I guess another way of saying it would be, "If you don't vote for someone you don't care for, don't share values with, don't agree with on a multitude of subjects, don't believe can make the world a better place, then you don't have a right to complain." Pshaw! Of course you have a right to complain! And maybe you have a right to complain more than anyone.

More accurately I think the saying should be "If you don't pay your taxes, you don't have a right to complain." See, I think if you don't pay your taxes and aren't being part of the process, then you don't have a right to complain. But please don't feel obligated to vote for someone you don't want to see elected just to have the right to complain. You have that right. Make a lot of noise. That's what being an American is all about. Our right (duty really) to question, or complain, or protest or (Heaven forbid) burn a flag, is what makes us beautiful. And we are beautiful.

Americans the Beautiful.