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- Written by Rex M. Rogers
Why oh why do we mow grass growing in the medians of the nation’s interstates? But for a rare safety consideration this expenditure of time, money, and man-hours seems unnecessary, even extravagant, in these economically stressful times.
Think about this. This is not just a budgetary issue, though a big one. It’s a conservation issue. We’re burning hundreds of gallons of gasoline, sending comparable toxic emissions into the air, and cutting grasses and small bushes that might otherwise serve as shelter for small animals.
If safety, as in line of sight, is an issue, than brush hog away. But this can’t be the only reason because in some areas miles of interstate medians are allowed to grow into small woodlands. If we must always maintain full line of sight than why are these woods permitted to grow?
If aesthetics is the issue, than plant—as some areas do—the medians and sidebars with wildflowers, perennials, wheat, or small decorative native bushes. Turn the medians and sidebars into attractive self-maintaining natural spaces.
If jobs for mower men and women are the issue, than take the money not expended on gasoline and mowers and instead spend it on flora. Send these men and women out in their orange jackets to plant, plant, plant.
Why do we feel compelled to cut, cut, cut just so we can look at the “lawn” in the middle of the roadway? Is it a leftover trend from the suburbanization of America that began in the 1950s? Is it a habit carried forward from the 1960s when the interstate system was first built—a kind of borrowed sensibility from the German autobahns? Is it we think being able to see farther down the highway somehow makes us safer in our need for speed?
Whatever the motivation we continue to mow like there’s mow tomorrow.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2011
*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Rex or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow him at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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- Written by Rex M. Rogers
Remember that little kid in the Bruce Willis movie, “The Sixth Sense,” who said, “I see dead people”? Well, thankfully, I don’t. But “I find pennies.”
I know this revelation is not as startling or creepy as admitting seeing dead people. But hey, one takes ones talents as they come, and for me, it’s finding pennies.
I find them constantly. For years, not a week has gone by that I haven't seen pennies on the floor on jets, under my foot on a sidewalk, tucked into a nook on a shuttle bus. I find them in pristine places like fancy restaurants. I find them even when they’re camouflaged against brown carpet or in dirt. I find pennies day and night, week after week, at home and abroad. And yes, I pick them up.
Once in awhile I find a nickel or a quarter but not often. No, my clairvoyant gift is for pennies. I call it a gift because I’ve never met anyone else who has this story. Perhaps you think I am joking, but I am not. I’ve found pennies so consistently in so many odd places I can’t explain it other than as a gift.
Then there was my Grandma Goldia Rogers. I’d be visiting her on the farm and she’d say, “Let’s go find a 4-Leaf Clover.” Now I don’t know if you’ve ever gone looking for a 4-Leaf Clover, but if you haven’t, you probably do not know that they are rare and virtually impossible to see amidst their hundreds of 3-Leaf Clover cousins.
But this didn’t deter Grandma. Off we’d go and, you guessed it, in a matter of minutes she’d say, “Here’s one,” and hold up a 4-Leaf Clover as big as life. She simply willed it to happen and it did. She did this for years.
I’m not quite that gifted. I’ve never “gone looking” or “willed” the appearance of a penny. I just go my way, look down, and there it is.
That’s actually my theory as to the material substance of this “gift.” When I walk I tend to look down. I look around and I’m aware of the world around me, very aware. But I scan the ground too. So I think I see pennies others just haven’t looked down to see. Simple physics.
But maybe it isn’t physics. Maybe it’s metaphysics. Whatever it is, “I find pennies.”
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2011
*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Rex or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow him at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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In the wake of disasters or tragedies I hear people, including anchors on national news programs, enjoin us to “Say a little prayer for them.”
Sometimes it’s more personal: “Before I do XYZ I’m going a say a little prayer and just go for it.” Or maybe it’s a plea for assistance: “Say a little prayer for us tonight.” I’ve even heard celebrities on late night talk shows say something like “Say a little prayer” in response to the host observing the guest’s just experienced some good career developments.
So what does “Say a little prayer” mean and where did the phrase originate? Maybe it got started in pop culture in the late 1960s with Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s song lyrics:
“I say a little prayer for you.
I say a little prayer for you.
Forever, forever, you'll stay in my heart
And I will love you
Forever, forever we never will part
Oh, how I'll love you…”
Bacharach and David wrote these lyrics as part of the song, “I Say A Little Prayer,” developed for Dionne Warwick in 1967, later recorded by Aretha Franklin in 1968, and later still by several others. The song was and perhaps remains an international hit.
The backstory on the lyrics suggest at least David was trying to invoke metaphoric sympathy for American soldiers in Viet Nam. If so the public never really caught on because people responded to the love story conveyed by Warwick and Franklin and the song is cataloged under "romantic" rather than "social protest." In any event, Bacharach and David probably didn’t invent the phrase. More likely they borrowed it from expressions they’d heard growing up. Assuming this logic, the song served less to initiate a phrase than to borrow and bold print it in the cultural lexicon.
People use the phrase, I think, on several levels:
--Sincerely—asking for or promising prayer, maybe not a lot of prayer but prayer nonetheless.
--Superstitiously—like saying “Wish me luck” or “I hope I’m lucky” or “Knock on wood,” all intended to offer supplication to the fates while hoping for favor.
--Colloquially—using the phrase as filler without really considering much less embracing its possible meaning, like “Have a good one.”
In the last two instances, saying “a little prayer” becomes an easy religious-but-not too-religious way of covering your bets, so to speak. It’s like people crossing themselves who are not and never have been Catholic, sort of a just in case.
Another thing that interests me is the nature of the prayer. What, exactly, is “a little prayer” as opposed to “prayer” or maybe “a big prayer”? To the best of my knowledge there’s no weights and measures in Scripture determining the size of a prayer.
So is asking “Say a little prayer for me” a bad thing? I guess I wouldn’t go there. In the end, I’d rather encourage people to acknowledge rather than ignore God’s will in the world and life, even if it’s simply a “little” bit.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2011
*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Rex or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow him at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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Former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm recently tweeted:
"Another guy guv admits 2 cheating on his wife. Maybe we need more women governors. Guys: keep ur pants zipped, for Pete's sake. #Arnold"
Of course Governor Granholm was referring to scandal news plaguing the house of Schwarzenegger wherein he admitted having fathered a child some thirteen or more years ago by a woman other than his wife of twenty-five years, Maria Shriver. And to add insult to injury he’s apparently kept it from Maria and all others since. In other words, he’s lived a lie for more than a decade in front of his wife, four children, and the California citizenry.
Some have suggested former Governor Granholm would not have made this comment relative to a Democrat. But I think this is unfair and sells her short. Plenty of people are fed up with male politicians’ blatant sexual infidelities demonstrating their lack of character if not also lack of wisdom, and to feel this way isn’t about partisanship.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is just the latest secret sex saga. We’ve been subjected to a running tally of these stories: Dominique Strauss-Kahn—the former IMF chief recently accused of rape, Eliot Spitzer—the former New York Governor now turned CNN anchor (I still don’t know what CNN is thinking)—cross-state-lines prostitute scandal, Mark Sanford—the former South Carolina Governor with an Argentine “soulmate,” David Patterson, John Ensign, David Vitter, James McGreevey, John Edwards, Bill Clinton, or way back, Gary Hart, Ted Kennedy. Even John McCain and Newt Gingrich get into the act if you check their record. And there are many more both present and past if you reach back even further, Lyndon B. Johnson, John F. Kennedy, FDR.
So it may be that former Governor Granholm is correct. Maybe we do need to elect more women political leaders.
It's not to say that women are invulnerable to infidelity or so-called philandering. It doesn't take a Ph.D. in birds-n-bees to recognize that women were involved in nearly all these stories (McGreevey being one exception). But still, I'm with Governor Granholm on this one.
I’m ready to give women with character an opportunity to lead.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2011
*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Rex or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow him at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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- Written by Elizabeth Rogers Drouillard
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Watching grandchildren take important steps in their lives is one of the joys of being a grandfather. Such was my privilege yesterday, Sunday May 22, 2011. I attended the morning worship service at Mars Hill Bible Church, Grand Rapids, Michigan and watched about one hundred people be baptized, including three grandsons. Grandma attended a different church where she presented an update on Women At Risk, International, for which she volunteers, hence one source of my desire to video this event.
Needless to say, it was fun. Mother Elizabeth and father Joe didn't know if the little guy, Jordan, might back out. He was worried about the depth of the water. But he followed his brothers, braved the water, nodded his head to all the pastors' questions, and held his nose.
Each of the boys had earlier at different times made personal professions of faith in Christ. They understood that the water and the baptism experience was simply a matter of obedience to God and a way of testifying to their faith already secured by trusting in Jesus.
At this time, we have one more grandchild, also a boy, and we hope to perhaps see more grandchildren some day if the Lord wills. Either way, I hope to be there to watch grandson number four be baptized when the right time comes.
In Matthew 19:14 it is recorded: "Jesus said, 'Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.'"
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2011
*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Rex or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow him at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.