WINGSPREAD Ezine for September, 2024

Spreading your wings in a perplexing world
September, 2024                                                    James P. Hurd

Please forward and share this Ezine with others. Thank you.

Please email comments or suggestions about this Ezine to: hurd@usfamily.net.

Contents

  • Writer’s Corner
  • Blessed Unbeliever 
  • This month’s story
  • This month’s puzzler
  • WINGSPREAD Ezine subscription information
  • Wisdom

Writer’s Corner

Tip for writers: Ideally, the first paragraph of your story should do the following: 1. Introduce the main character(s), characters whom readers are willing to invest time getting to know, strong characters. 2. Give some idea of the world of the story: location, time period. 3. Hint at the main conflict or challenge. 4. Establish the tone of the story. 5. Fill the first paragraph with not only narrative or description; fill it with action.

Favorite metaphors: cow-flecked hills, moon with upturned horns, poster child for the human condition.

Book of the month: Isaac Azimov’s Foundation Series, 1950s. At some time in the distant future ships traveling faster than light ply the starry field of our Milky Way, knitting together several billion solar systems and quintillions of people The First Empire is destroyed and now it’s up to Hari Sheldon and the Foundation to construct a new empire. Nuclear blasters, mind control, a dangerous mutant—all this and more in a cosmic drama that unfolds across several millennia and the vast reaches of the galaxy.

BLESSED UNBELIEVER novel

Blessed Unbeliever (paper or Kindle version) can be found at Wipf and Stock Publishers, Amazon https://a.co/d/9su5F3o or wherever good books are sold.

New Story: The World of Center Street Elementary

September, 1946. Mother took my hand as we walked the dirt along Mr. Wheeler’s avocado orchard, turned to walk the three blocks of Culver Street, then crossed the playground toward Center Street school. I raised my eyes to view the enormous three-story wooden cube with its green-shingled hip roof and windows that stared out with unblinking eyes. I was excited about the classroom work but worried about meeting new kids. Mother pointed to a cave-like opening under the entrance stairs. “That’s the boys’ bathroom. The girls’ is on the other side; never go in there.” She said goodbye as I climbed the wooden steps to where Mrs. Brennan extended her carefully-tended white hand. She wore her greying hair up in a bun and her blue dress reached to her calves. I glanced behind me to see my mother disappearing across the playground. . . To read more, click here.  

Leave a comment on the website and share with others. Thanks.

This month’s puzzler (thanks to Car Talk archives)

An 11-year-old boy is standing at a bus stop in a very small town waiting for the #12 bus and holding his just-purchased fishing pole.

The bus finally arrives, but as the little boy begins to step up onto the bus, the bus driver stops him. 

“You can’t get on here with that fishing rod,” the bus driver says.

“Why not?” the little boy asks.

“There’s a new city ordinance that prohibits anything—packages, bags or anything at all—being carried on the bus that’s longer than four feet. And that fishing rod is longer than four feet. I’m sorry.”

“Well, how am I supposed to get home?” the little boy asks.

“That’s your problem, kid. That fishing rod is five feet long, so you can’t ride the bus.Sorry,” says the bus driver.

So, the kid figures he will have to return the fishing rod, get his money back, so he can get home on the bus. He goes to the store, and the clerk tells him, “No refunds. Sorry kid. You’re stuck with it.”

So he’s stuck with the fishing rod and no way to get home because he can’t take a cab because it’s too expensive.

He walks back into the store again, realizing he can’t return it. He stands thinking for a second. 

Five minutes later, he’s on the bus legally, riding home with the fishing rod, without altering it, breaking it, sawing it in half, or collapsing it. 

He does nothing whatsoever to alter the fishing rod.

How does he do it?

(Answer will appear in next month’s WINGSPREAD newsletter.)

Answer to last month’s puzzler: 

 You recall Julie’s dad had five daughters: June, July, August and September. What was the fifth daughter’s name? The fifth daughter? Julie! (Please don’t unsubscribe; the puzzler will be harder next time.)

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Click here https://jimhurd.com/home/  to subscribe to this WINGSPREAD ezine, sent direct to your email inbox, every month. You will receive a free article for subscribing. Please share this URL with interested friends, “like” it on Facebook, retweet on Twitter, etc.

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Wisdom

Disappeared words

Well, I hope you are Hunky Dory when you read this and chuckle. Here are some old expressions that have become obsolete because of the inexorable march of technology. These phrases included: Don’t touch that dial; Carbon copy; You sound like a broken record; and Hung out to dry.

Eeyoring (being glum, despondent)

Mergatroyd ? Do you remember that word? Would you believe the spell-checker did not recognize the word? “Heavens to Mergatroyd!”

The other day a not so elderly (I say 75) lady said something to her son about driving a Jalopy; and he looked at her quizzically and said, “What the heck is a Jalopy?” He had never heard of the word “jalopy!” She knew she was old . . . but not that old.

Back in the olden days we had a lot of moxie . We’d put on our best bib and tucker, to straighten up and fly right.

Heavens to Betsy!

Gee whillikers!

Jumping Jehoshaphat!

Holy Moley!

We were in like Flynn and living the life of Riley, and even a regular guy couldn’t accuse us of being a knucklehead, a nincompoop or a pill. Not for all the tea in China!

Back in the olden days, life used to be swell, but when’s the last time anything was swell? Swell has gone the way of beehives, pageboys and the D.A.; of spats, knickers, fedoras, poodle skirts, saddle shoes, and pedal pushers.

Oh, my aching back! Kilroy was here, but he isn’t anymore.

We wake up from what surely has been just a short nap, and before we can say, “Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!” Or, “This is a fine kettle of fish!” We discover that the words we grew up with, the words that seemed omnipresent as oxygen, have vanished with scarcely a notice from our tongues and our pens and our keyboards.

Poof, go the words of our youth, the words we’ve left behind. We blink, and they’re gone. Where have all those great phrases gone?

Long gone: Pshaw, The milkman did it. Hey! It’s your nickel. Don’t forget to pull the chain. Knee high to a grasshopper.

Well, Fiddlesticks! Going like sixty. I’ll see you in the funny papers. Don’t take any wooden nickels. Wake up and smell the roses.

It turns out there are more of these lost words and expressions than Carter has liver pills.

This can be disturbing stuff! (Carter’s Little Liver Pills are gone too!)

Leaves us to wonder where Superman will find a phone booth.

See ya later, alligator! Okey Dokey .

From the heart

  • Some people are kind, polite, and sweet-spirited
    Until you try to sit in their pews. 
  • Many folks want to serve God,
    But only as advisers.
  • The good Lord didn’t create anything without a purpose,
    But mosquitoes come close.  
  • Opportunity may knock once,
    But temptation bangs on the front door forever. 
  • We’re called to be witnesses, not lawyers or judges.
  • I don’t know why some people change churches;
    What difference does it make which one you stay home from?
  • Be ye fishers of men. You catch ’em – He’ll clean ’em.
  • Coincidence is when God chooses to remain anonymous.
  • God grades on the cross, not the curve.
  • He who angers you, controls you!
  • What more could we want
    than to be a healing presence
    in each other’s life?

The prophetic tasks of the church are to tell the truth in a society that lives in illusion, grieve in a society that practices denial, and express hope in a society that lives in despair.
                                                                                                Walter Brueggemann

I will go out and carve a tunnel of hope from a mountain of despair.
                                                                                                Martin Luther King Jr.

The World of Center Street Elementary

September, 1946. Mother took my hand as we walked the dirt along Mr. Wheeler’s avocado orchard, turned to walk the three blocks of Culver Street, then crossed the playground toward Center Street school. I raised my eyes to view the enormous three-story wooden cube with its green-shingled hip roof and windows that stared out with unblinking eyes. I was excited about the classroom work but worried about meeting new kids. Mother pointed to a cave-like opening under the entrance stairs. “That’s the boys’ bathroom. The girls’ is on the other side; never go in there.”

She said goodbye as I climbed the wooden steps to where Mrs. Brennan extended her carefully-tended white hand. She wore her greying hair up in a bun and her blue dress reached to her calves. I glanced behind me to see my mother disappearing across the playground. As we entered, I smelled the waxed hardwood floor and turned to gawk at the carved wooden staircase rising toward second floor.

When the noon buzzer rang, Mrs. Brennan told us, “You may eat downstairs in the lunchroom or outside under the playground shelter.” Students walked to the cloakroom and grabbed lunches out of their cubbyholes but I left the building and wandered around the playground hungry, wondering why my mother hadn’t packed me a lunch.

Principal Ebersole saw me. “Are you in kindergarten?”

“Yes.”

“Why are you still here? Kindergarten ends at noon.”

“Mrs. Brennan never told us to go home.”

“Mrs. Brennan? She’s the first-grade teacher. You should have been in Mrs. Baker’s class.”

“No one told me . . .”

Mother came to pick me up.

The next morning, my neighbor Jerry and I were walking to school along Culver when we passed a dark, stuccoed house with tall grass, scraggly bushes and the window shades pulled down. “A witch lives there,” Jerry told me. We started running.

A block farther on, we looked down Harwood Street and saw the tiny store that sold Bazooka gum, M&Ms, and candy cigarettes. We walked over, searching our pockets for change. I opened the little paper packet Mom had sent with me and used the money to buy M&Ms for Jerry and me. We arrived at Kindergarten all sweet and chocolatey.

After a few weeks of walking down Culver Street we got braver and shortcut through our orange orchard smelling the fragrant blossoms so we could cut through Joe’s Lumberyard—a chaotic assortment of broken chairs, metal tables, old doors, window frames with peeling paint, derelict staircases, ceiling trusses, broken strips of siding, toilet stools, bathtubs, kitchen sinks and faucets, piles of used lumber—all strewn helter-skelter with little rabbit runs winding between. It looked like a ghost town hit by a tornado.

Stray cats haunted the woodpiles, along with the occasional rabbit. Once we saw a coyote. And then there was Sam the Tramp who guarded the lumberyard with his snarly dog Butch. Unshaven, with his long dishwater-gray hair hanging to his earlobes, he wore torn brown pants too big for him, scuffed shoes with holes in the leather and a ripped straw hat, appearing as a person destiny had a serious grudge against. He slept in a tiny tarpaper shack that stood amidst the lumber and debris. He didn’t talk; he just sat in front of his shack on an old chair with missing spindles and stared at us until we took off running. “I think he’s a serial killer,” Jerry told me.

. Mrs. Baker, serious as a Puritan preacher, sat soberly with every inch of her body erect in her desk chair. When she rose to illustrate something, her fingernails would scratch the blackboard. And yet she had a great heart for her students. Her classroom had plastered walls reaching high to the ceilings, large windows that allowed the sun to beat in onto the hardwood floor and no air conditioning. Chains supported big hanging light fixtures that glowed beige. A sandbox stood in one corner. The letters of the alphabet in block letters and cursive ran along the top of the blackboards. We sat at cast-iron-legged wooden desks on which some past students had carved their initials. A hole was cut in the top that previously held an ink jar, the purpose of which, my dad told me, was for dipping the pigtails of the girl in front of you. A pencil sharpener hung on the wall near the blackboard. Once when I blew in it to clean out the shavings, pulverized lead flew out all over my face

We always began by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance but it was years before I learned what “republic” and “indivisible” meant. I liked learning about the pilgrims and singing patriotic songs—“God Bless America,” “America the Beautiful.” Then  a song about leading the tow-mules sixteen miles along the Erie Canal and finally, “Las Chiapanecas,” about the Mexican girls who danced twirling their full skirts. I don’t remember any opening prayers. I learned to form letters and to add and subtract. Being left-handed, I would pull my pencil across the page and slant the letters to the right. The teacher gave up trying to change me. When mid-morning came, we marched down to the lunchroom where we drank our little cartons of milk, free if your family was low-income.

Then we returned to class to read from Dick and Jane—a beautiful picture story book about little kids and their dog, Spot. “Look, Dick, look.” “See Spot run.” “Jump, Spot, jump.” Dick and Jane lived in an all-white neighborhood with no dirt or trash or crime, yet still patrolled by big, friendly, blue-suited policemen. Next, we had show-and-tell time when kids would stand in front of the class and tell stories about themselves. Some of these may have been true. Once Harold told his story with his fly open. Nobody said anything.

The next year I was sitting in Mrs. Brennan’s first grade class as the hands of the big Seth Thomas wall clock nibbled away at the morning until the piercing buzzer signaled lunchtime. We carried our lunches outside to eat under wooden shelters that shielded us from the sun. The kids who ate bologna and cheese sandwiches made fun of my mom’s sandwiches of mayonnaise and avocado, made with avocados from our own orchard. Once when Darlene walked by, a boy yelled, “I wish I had that swing in my back yard!” I didn’t know what he meant..

Out on the playground, the LA basin smogged our throats. But sometimes, hot, dry, fifty-mile-per-hour Santana winds would roll in from the east through the Banning pass. The wind blew all the smog out to sea, leaving the air so clean it quivered. The trees swung their leaves like nets and shed some of their smaller branches. Inhaling the smell of blowing dust, we tried out the merry-go-round, swings, a sagging, netless basketball hoop and the exercise bars. The merry-go-round was a marvel of perpetual motion that seemed to spin forever, making your head dizzy. But if it spun too fast, the bearings would grind and it would throw kids off. The tall swings had canvas seats held by long chains. The fifth graders told us they could pump the swings so hard they looped-the-loop. I had nightmares about looping, then crashing down on the high crossbar. I spent hours shooting baskets at the solitary, sad and sagging iron hoop.

Kids would jump and grab the parallel bars with gritty, sweaty hands, then do the dead man’s drop. You got swinging by your knees, then released at the top of the swing and tried to land on your feet. When I  tried it I landed on my backside and knocked my breath away. The girls would hang upside down on these bars with their dresses falling down over their heads, yelling at the staring boys, “Get your eyes full!” The Center Street girls fascinated me. They seemed a different species, walking around the gravely playground in their white dresses with the little starched collars, white bows in their hair.

We played kickball on the dirt diamond. When it was my turn to kick, Gary Bradley sauntered over, pushed me down and took my place. I started crying. I tried to avoid him but later, in middle school, he beat me up again. Gary—poster child for the human condition, terrifying pustule of ego with bulbous eyes, puffy face and wearing an attitude tough as nails, grated on people like tinfoil on a filling. He gave me my first bloody nose. Then Sherman, an unerupted volcano with an IQ below the range of his body temperature, would push boys down onto the gravel. I avoided him until the day Mom invited him to go to church with us. Awkward. I assumed. Jesus’ command to “love your enemies” did not include Gary or Sherman,

We met Okie and Arkie kids whose parents had fled to California from the Midwest of the 1930s to escape the terrible dustbowl droughts. They took over the jobs the locals did not want and began replacing the Mexican orange pickers in the orchards. The girls in their faded dresses looked as if their mothers had forgotten to comb their hair. The boys wore longer, disheveled hair, overalls instead of jeans, and they talked funny. Big belt buckles. You didn’t want to sit next to them. They smelled perspired and If they sniffed something, they would lean over and smell your crotch.

Most Mexicans lived on the other side of Glassell and went to Killefer School. In the 1940s, Orange Unified was one of the first districts to integrate so later, in first grade, we got Richard Herrera. Brown-skinned with straight black hair, he wore a tiny crucifix hanging from a gold chain. His English was pretty good. We became friends.

Every Wednesday, the higher grades got to practice jumping onto a fire escape slide that spiraled down from the third floor. During Cub Scout nights, some of us would sneak up to the dark third floor and feel our way over to the fire escape. One after another we launched, sailing down the slick slide. We found the exit doors locked, so we had to climb back up the slide, slipping and sliding. One night the principal caught us. It was totally worth it.

At the end of my fifth grade year, Center Street finally closed her doors. That day, anyone could slide down the fire escape—even the principal! But soon they bulldozed the school to the ground. When graduation day came we filed by the principal to receive our diplomas. Afterwards the teachers assembled the students to do the Bunny Hop. But Silver Acres Church was fundamentalist and Brother Cantrell preached hard against dancing. So instead of dancing, Kevin and I sat in the hallway at a table playing chess. Kevin was happy but I felt like a nerd. That summer Jerry and I were walking through Joe’s junkyard when we saw an abandoned metal helix lying on its side, forlorn and forsaken. We stared at the twisted metal of the derelict fire escape.

After graduation I thought my bullying troubles were over. Until I moved on to the anteroom of Hades—Orange Intermediate School. Another world to conquer!

WINGSPREAD Ezine for August, 2024


Spreading your wings in a perplexing world
August, 2024                                         James P. Hurd

Please forward and share this E-zine with others. Thank you.

Contents

  • Writer’s Corner
  • Blessed Unbeliever 
  • This month’s story
  • This month’s puzzler
  • WINGSPREAD Ezine subscription information
  • Wisdom

Writer’s Corner

Tip for writers:. A good (but hard) rule to follow is to never use a metaphor you’ve seen before. One of my favorites by Mark Twain: “Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?”

Task for you: Send me an original metaphor. I’ll publish them in the next WINGSPREAD.

Try using some of these words in your writing:

  • Hurkle-durkling          Staying in bed awake after the alarm goes off
  • Outré               Unusual or startling
  • Smellmaxxing Think tween and teen boys buying $300 cologne
  • Polycule          A molecule or “pod” of consensual non-monogamous people
  • Deepfake         Manipulated image, video or audio of people doing or saying things they never did or said
  • Bespoke          Made for a particular client
  • Belch up          Something nasty reappears
  • Scabrous         Indecent, salacious
  • Anodyne         Harmless; inoffensive
  • vertiginous     Causing vertigo
  • Perseverate    Repeat or prolong an action
  • Oeuvre             A painter’s or composer’s body of work
  • Limerence      Obsession with another person, oftentimes who does not know you
  • Swatting          A fake call to 911 to send emergency vehicles to an address
  • Couture           High-fashion designer clothes
  • Rizz                 Romantic appeal or charm

BLESSED UNBELIEVER novel

Blessed Unbeliever (paper or Kindle version) can be found at Wipf and Stock Publishers, Amazon https://a.co/d/9su5F3o or wherever good books are sold.

New story: “Identity Crisis”

Man (sic) cannot name himself.
He waits for God or Satan
To tell him who he is.
                                    Unknown

Americans are experiencing a crisis of identity. I asked a middle school counselor why people came to see her. “Anxiety!” she said, “feeling they can’t measure up.” At this crucial age students compare themselves to others, especially to the images on social media that tell them two things. 1. There are Beautiful People in the world. 2. You are not one of them. . . .

To read more, click here  https://jimhurd.com/2024/08/16/identity-crisis/

Leave a comment on the website and share with others. Thanks.

This month’s puzzler

 Julie’s dad had five daughters: June, July, August and September. What was the fifth daughter’s name? (Apologies to the expert puzzlers who find this puzzler too easy!)

(Answer will appear in next month’s WINGSPREAD newsletter.)

Answer to last month’s puzzler: 

So how can Sherlock Holmes be 32 the day before yesterday, but will turn 35 next year?
Here is the answer:

Watson and Holmes are sitting by the fire on January 1st when this conversation was happening. 
The day before yesterday, Sherlock was 32.
Yesterday, December 31, was his birthday and he turned 33.
So this year he will turn 34 on December 31st, and next year, he’ll turn 35. 

Trick question, but a good one!

Subscribe free to this Ezine  

Click here https://jimhurd.com/home/  to subscribe to this WINGSPREAD ezine, sent direct to your email inbox, every month. You will receive a free article for subscribing. Please share this URL with interested friends, “like” it on Facebook, retweet on Twitter, etc.

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Wisdom

I’m so single right now that when I stood on a cliff and shouted “I love you,” my echo replied, “I just want to be friends.”

Red Skelton’s secret to the perfect marriage

  1. Two times a week we go to a nice restaurant, have a little beverage, good food and companionship. She goes on Tuesdays, I go on Fridays.
  2. We also sleep in separate beds. Hers is in California and mine is in Texas.
  3. I asked my wife where she wanted to go for our anniversary. “Somewhere I haven’t been in a long time!” she said. But when I suggested the kitchen she got all mad . . .
  4. We always hold hands. If I let go, she shops.
  5. My wife told me the car wasn’t running well because there was water in the carburetor. I asked where the car was. She told me, “In the lake.”
  6. Remember: Marriage is the number one cause of divorce.
  7. I married Miss Right. I just didn’t know her first name was ‘Always’.
  8. I haven’t spoken to my wife in 18 months. I don’t like to interrupt her.
  9. The last fight was my fault though. My wife asked, “What’s on the TV?” I said, “Dust!”
  • American author Dorothy Parker once wrote: “If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second-greatest favor you can do them is to present them with a copy of The Elements of Style. The first-greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.”
  • People often mistake me for an adult because of my age.
  • A truck loaded with thousands of copies of Roget’s Thesaurus crashed yesterday losing its entire load. Witnesses were stunned, startled, aghast, taken aback, stupefied, confused, shocked, rattled, paralyzed, dazed, bewildered, mixed up, surprised, awed, dumbfounded, nonplussed, flabbergasted, astounded, amazed, confounded, astonished, overwhelmed, horrified, numbed, speechless, and perplexed.

Identity Crisis

Man (sic) cannot name himself.
He waits for God or Satan
To tell him who he is.
                                    Unknown

Americans are experiencing a crisis of identity. I asked a middle school counselor why people came to see her. “Anxiety!” she said, “feeling they can’t measure up.” At this crucial age students compare themselves to others, especially to the images on social media that tell them two things. 1. There are Beautiful People in the world. 2. You are not one of them.

By identity we mean how a society views a person and how a person chooses to view themselves. We work on our identity all of our lives, either reinforcing our received identity or questioning that identity and seeking to transform it. Some Asian American leaders are excited about Kamala Harris becoming the first Asian American president. But Donald Trump criticized her for first identifying as Asian Indian and then “happened to turn black. . . Is she Indian or is she black?” (She has long identified as black; she graduated from Howard University where she belonged to a “black” sorority.) Of course she’s both. How can an outsider judge Harris’ racial identity? It’s a strange argument—saying that she “changed” from Asian to black. It may be a veiled critique of people of “mixed” ancestry. And President Obama—most people (and he himself) consider him “black.” He is half “white” but nobody considers him white. The old “one drop” rule applies—if you have one drop of “black” blood you’re black. In the 1800s the one drop rule was important to try to forbid the mixing of European with the African slave races. As late as 1980, Bob Jones University asked students to declare their race and forbade dating between the “races.”

Identity matters. An ambiguous or negative identity can provoke depression, anger, social isolation and even homicide or suicide. For example, National Institutes of Mental Health reports that gender dysphoria (confusion about one’s gender) creates a profound confusion about identity and is reflected in higher suicide rates. Among transgender adults in the U.S., 81% have thought of suicide, 42% have tried it, and 56% have engaged in non-suicidal self-injury over their lifetimes.

My identity imposed by others?

People receive their identity from others. The child receives their identity from parents: gender, race and membership in a social or religious group (e.g., male white Protestant)..

Even more than our adopted daughters, our son struggled with his racial identity after we adopted him in Colombia. When he was eight, I told him that my great-grandfather Alex was born in Dublin. He asked me wide-eyed: “Dad—Are we Irish?”

Amish communities socialize their children to see themselves as a member of the Amish community. They erect barriers, physical and social, that limit the child’s contact with alternative possibilities. This illustrates the social nature of identity and the power of intentional socialization.

Most parents “gender” their children, e.g., encourage and strengthen the child’s gender identity. Children usually accept these imposed identities. How far should parents go to reinforce a child’s identity, or how enthusiastically should they support their wish to change? A suicidal girl in high school transitioned from female to male gender. His suicidal thoughts subsided. His father exclaimed, “I finally have the boy I wished for!”

Personally constructing an identity

People learn to reinforce their identities through clothing, grooming or behavior. The New York Times reported a recent event where 24 NBA rookies, before they were drafted, met to show off their clothes and discuss their decisions about how to represent themselves.

No one is condemned to accept their socially-imposed identity. But what happens when a person transgresses, challenges the identity given to them? They might start “talking black,” swearing, dressing differently, cosplaying (dressing and acting like a fictional or famous character). Sometimes transgression is temporary but sometimes it becomes permanent.

Amish young people sometimes attempt to leave their church, community and culture. People sometimes try to renounce their families. When young people go to college they may form new friend groups along with new opinions and new identities.

We all exhibit layered, hierarchical identities, some more salient than others. People may get caught displaying one identity in one group but codeswitching when in another group. Years ago I was on a train with a group of marines headed home after Pendleton Marine bootcamp. They were earnestly trying to clean up their foul “Marine language” before showing up at Mom and Dad’s door. Their new marine identity clashed with their identity in their family.

Standing out or fitting in? Instead of trying to fit in, some people may strive to stand out. An elementary school principal told me that when the fifth-grade kids were asked to form a boys’ line and a girls’ line, two students stood apart. They were trying out “nonbinary” (refusal to identify as either gender). I asked the principal if “nonbinary” would become their permanent identity. “Probably not,” he said. “They’re just trying it out.”

My adopted son identified as African-American all through school and beyond. But after he turned 40, he sent off his DNA sample to figure out his genetic history. It came back with a little African but substantial “Spanish” ancestry. So he changed and began to identify as Latino. He feels more comfortable with this new identity and is trying to grow into it. I joke with him that he should start wearing Converse tennis shoes and squinting a little!  

“I am who I say I am.” And yet when does my freedom impinge upon others? People may try to adopt a new identity but their family or social group may refuse to accept the change. So they must give up the attempt to change or seek a new social group. Suppose I am white but I try to identify as Latino or black on a college application. Or try to present myself as having Tourette’s syndrome without being diagnosed. These experimental identities carry economic and legal implications and ultimately may not be accepted by others.

Performing gender identity

Is gender identity personally constructed? A young child gradually learns their gender identity and learns how to perform that identity. When I was a young boy I was desperate to fit the image of a male—I would try to cross my legs like a man rather than like a woman. Elvira de Bruyn was a Belgian cycling champion who excelled in women’s cycling races in the 1930s. However in 1937 he declared he wished to live the rest of his life as a man.

What is “female” and what is “male” behavior, anyway? These identities are not all arbitrary, not all culturally imposed. Richard Dawkins argues that in any species, being male or female demands certain behaviors, especially those behaviors most closely connected to reproduction. This is because natural selection rewards certain behavioral strategies in males, and different strategies in females, by imparting reproductive success (offspring). A male has an unlimited supply of sperm, but a female has a limited number of valuable eggs. Thus, for instance, a male may seek a variety of sexual partners and change partners more often while a female may seek fewer partners and focus more on quality and caretaking. Thus, although males and females each show a wide spectrum of behaviors, we are warranted in identifying as typical those “male” and “female” behaviors that are key to reproductive success.

Here are a few terms related to sexual preference and gender orientation.

  • Sexual identity: Innate identity based on genitalia, DNA and secondary sex characteristics
  • Intersexual: ambiguous genitalia
  • Bisexual: sexually attracted to both male and female persons
  • Gay, lesbian, homosexual: same-sex attracted
  • Queer: non-conforming to majority ideas of sex or gender
  • Cisgender: My gender conforms to my biological sex characteristics
  • Transvestite: dressing as the opposite gender
  • Transgender: adopting a gender that does not conform to one’s biological or birth sex. Transgender people may seek speech therapy to feminize or masculinize their voices, trying to conform to their new gender.
  • Cosplay: dressing up as a famous character, real or fictional. For instance, children of both genders may wear an “Elsa” dress when cosplaying the Disney character.
  • Nonbinary: not exclusively identifying with male or female gender. Switching between male and female roles or even trying to avoid stereotypic male or female behaviors.
  • Two-spirit: Refers to individuals in some native American cultures who demonstrate aspects of both male and female genders
  • LGBTQIAI2S+  Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual, queer, inquiring, asexual, intersex, two-spirit, plus “other.” This is a catch-all term for non-traditional gender and sexual roles.

Legal protection of identity

Can I force others to honor my chosen identity(ies)? Identity politics argues for the rights of individuals to assert their membership in a group: ethnic, religious, sexual, etc. Many states have “hate crime” laws to prosecute offenders targeting certain ethnic, racial or religious groups. These laws compel the many to respect the rights of the few. Just last month, California banned schools from forcing teachers to notify parents when students request different names or pronouns. (In protest, Elon Musk said he would move the headquarters of his companies X and SpaceX from California to Texas.)

In Tennessee, four transgender women plaintiffs petitioned the court to change their sex on their birth certificates to conform to their current gender identity. Just recently the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a 2023 district court ruling that found that the state of Tennessee can legally prohibit changing a child’s sex on their birth certificate. Across the states, laws about identity are constantly changing—encouraging or restricting people’s attempts to assert their identity.

And bathrooms. Some schools have responded to the “bathroom issue” by creating unisex bathrooms. For instance, Blaine High School has generic bathrooms (no doors, wide entrances, a row of sinks on one side and individual stalls on the other). This prevents transgendered men from walking into single-sex women’s bathrooms (because there are none).

And yet even the law does not and should not compel acceptance of certain identities: criminal, abusive, pedophile (or the euphemism “minor-attracted person,” MAP ). An 18-year-old person cannot identify as a 22-year-old so they can buy alcohol. The law prevents an individual from impersonating a doctor or an officer of the law. It is illegal to gain employment using falsified credentials.

Religious groups have successfully litigated against some identity laws. For instance, Christian colleges are not yet compelled to hire individuals who identify as gay or transgender. These colleges argue that this hiring would violate their religious beliefs about the sacredness of heterosexual sex and biblical teaching asserting two distinct biblical genders.

Discovering a healthy identity

How can I name myself, be true to myself? If the epigraph at the head of this essay is true, we ultimately need to find our identity in the transcendent— an identity primordial, unchanging, holistic, certain.

For Christians, the Bible encourages us to embrace a new identity. I “cannot name myself” but I can embrace and grow into the person God says I am. St. Paul talks about the old person and the new person. To become a Christ-follower means to embrace a new identity—child of God and brother/sister to Christ. This identity is neither imposed by our social group nor fabricated by the individual. It is a gift from God and is immune to the tides and storms that threaten to overwhelm. With a plethora of identities swirling around us we must choose who to trust. For Christians, our identity is rooted in trusting how God defines us.

Freedom Sunday

Here’s an op ed I wrote several years ago on “Freedom Sunday.”

Alan, please forgive me for walking out during our church’s Freedom Sunday. I mean you no disrespect. At our service you sit down near the front with your prosthetic leg in camo. I recognize your courage–the agony you endured plus your agony when you inflicted suffering on others. I pray for your complete healing—body, mind, and spirit.

 I grieve for you, but also for my church and her mixed loyalties. In the narthex, a huge American flag hangs over the cross, a crown of thorns obscuring its starry field. We sing “Battle Hymn of the Republic” and the spotlight swings to illuminate a raised white cross. “As he died to make men holy let us die to make men free…” On the big video screen behind the altar, three F−15’s flash over the three-crossed hill of Calvary. Not missionaries, but uniformed soldiers march up and down our church aisles bearing, not Christian, but military flags. Today, Caesar trumps Christ. The sword trumps the dove. America’s founding fathers trump Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

It seems that even more than the cross, patriotism bonds people together. In front of the pulpit I see the central sacred symbol—erect between army boots stands an upright AK-47 rifle holding a helmet. We learn it’s even okay for Christians to kill other Christians if the targets are fighting in enemy armies. Today, the nonviolent, bloodied Lamb of God wears camo and carries a gun. They’d better not try to take away his rights again. Our children learn the lesson well—it takes redemptive violence to bring peace.

On Freedom Sunday the church cheerleads for the State, praising its force as she mourns her own dead and wounded. The State returns the favor and declares the church tax-exempt.

 So Alan, I honor you. I’m glad the church makes a place for you at Christ’s table. I love my country; I love my church. I’ll be back next Sunday. But today, I must walk out. Please forgive me.

Thank you.

James P. Hurd

Wingspread Ezine for May, 2024


Spreading your wings in a perplexing world
May, 2024                                                    James P. Hurd

Please forward and share this E-zine with others. Thank you.

Contents

  • Writer’s Corner
  • Blessed Unbeliever now available
  • This month’s story: “Trouble in Paradise”
  • This month’s puzzler
  • WINGSPREAD Ezine subscription information
  • Wisdom

Writer’s Corner

Tip for writers: Notice dialogue, description and metaphor used by other writers. These can be adapted for your own writing.

Word of the month: SCABROUS.    Indecent, salacious. (from “scabs”). “He began receiving scabrous publications.”

Question for you:  What is the best novel you’ve ever read and why? (I’ll publish some answers in our next ezine.)

BLESSED UNBELIEVER novel

Why did Sean, who received his Christian teaching with his mother’s milk, turn his back on faith and walk away? But unbeknownst, grace pursued.

Blessed Unbeliever (paper or Kindle version) can be found at Wipf and Stock Publishers, Amazon https://a.co/d/9su5F3o or wherever good books are sold.

New story

I remember telling myself, Wow, Eve! The big green snake was scary, but he really talked sense. I ate the fruit and I didn’t die. Anyway, God loves me so much I’m sure one piece of fruit is no big deal for him.

Shortly after we’d arrived in the park God told us, “Enjoy, celebrate, but don’t eat any fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil or you’ll die.” (Adam and I referred to the tree as “the TKGE.”)

I felt so happy when I walked over to the vegetable garden, my bare feet sinking into the most, fresh-smelling soil. I asked Adam, “If God loves us, why would he deny us fruit that looks so good?”

Adam says, “I don’t know; he has his reasons, I guess. Maybe it’s a test. Anyway there’re so many other good trees.”

“Yeah, but I wonder if the TKGE fruit looks different. There must be something special about it.”

“Maybe, but I’m busy here with the garden, so let’s talk about it later.” (In those special days, guys grew and ate green, leafy vegetables.) . . .  To read more, click here:  https://jimhurd.com/2024/04/30/trouble-in-paradise/

Leave a comment on the website and share with others. Thanks.

                                   Windows on our beautiful world

This month’s puzzler

 (Thanks to Car Talk puzzler archives.) Three guys check into a motel in the middle of nowhere. They’re running from the law and they have to lay low for a night. They approach the front desk clerk and he tells them that one room will be $30. This is the cheapest motel ever. 

They are really strapped for cash so they decide to share one room. They each give the clerk $10 and then they go to the room. 

After they leave, the clerk realizes that he overcharged them. They were having a special on rooms, and the price was supposed to be $25, not $30. So, he gives the bellboy $5 and asks him to return this to the three guys, since he overcharged them. 

So the bellboy takes the $5, but as he’s heading to the room, he thinks to himself, “Well, there are three guys, and $5. They won’t be able to split this evenly, so I’m going to keep $2, and give them $3.” He says to them, “Here’s $3. You were overcharged for the room.” And they say, “Thank you very much.” He leaves, having pocketed the $2.

So here is the question. 

They each spent $10 to start off with. Then they each get back $1. So they each spent $9 on the room. And 9 times 3 is 27. Plus the $2 that the bellboy stole. That all equals $29. 

So, what happened to the other dollar? Since they originally spent $30?

(Answer will appear in next month’s WINGSPREAD ezine.)

Answer to last month’s puzzler: 

You recall the guy had two girlfriends—one in Brooklyn and one in the Bronx. So, which one should he visit? The trains to Brooklyn and the Bronx run equally often—every 10 minutes, so he figures if he randomly arrives at the station, he should have equal time with each girl. But that isn’t what happens. Nine out of ten times he ends up going to Brooklyn. So, what is happening with these ten-minute trains? 

And here is the answer. Yes, the trains ran equally often, every 10 minutes. That is true. But the schedule was such that the Bronx train would always arrive one minute after the Brooklyn train. So, when the guy would get to the station and go down the steps to the platform, unless he got in there during that one minute window between the Brooklyn train and the Bronx train, he would always take the Brooklyn train because it always arrived first. So he would get on whichever train arrived first. And that was almost always the Brooklyn train. 

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Wisdom

Who knew? It was Shakespeare who invented these common words: accommodation, all-knowing, amazement, countless, dexterously, dislocate, dwindle, frugal, indistinguishable, lackluster, laughable, premeditated, star-crossed

Some wise sayings to celebrate spring:

  1. When one door closes and another door opens, you are probably in prison.
  2. Age 60 might be the new 40, but 9:00 pm is the new midnight.
  3. The older I get, the earlier it gets late.
  4. When I say, “The other day,” I could be referring to any time between yesterday and 15 years ago.
  5. I had my patience tested. I’m negative.
  6. Remember, if you lose a sock in the dryer, it comes back as a Tupperware lid that doesn’t fit any of your containers.
  7. If you’re sitting in public and a stranger takes the seat next to you, just stare straight ahead and say, “Did you bring the money?”
  8. When you ask me what I am doing today, and I say “nothing,” it does not mean I am free. It means I am doing nothing.
  9. I finally got eight hours of sleep. It took me three days, but whatever.
  10. I run like the winded.
  11. I hate when a couple argues in public, and I missed the beginning and don’t know whose side I’m on.
  12. When someone asks what I did over the weekend, I squint and ask, “Why, what did you hear?”
  13. I don’t mean to interrupt people. I just randomly remember things and get really excited.
  14. When I ask for directions, please don’t use words like “east.”
  15. Sometimes, someone unexpected comes into your life out of nowhere, makes your heart race, and changes you forever. We call those people cops.

Wordplay — ideas for marketing signage.

  • Signage for an Electrician’s truck:
    Let us remove your shorts.
  • Signage for a curtain delivery truck:
    Blind man driving.
  • Signage for a Podiatrist’s office:
    Time wounds all heels.
  • Signage for a Septic Tank Truck:
    Yesterday’s Meals on Wheels
  • Signage for an Optometrist’s Office:
    If you don’t see what you’re looking for,
    You’ve come to the right place.
  • Signage for a Plumber’s truck:
    We repair what your husband fixed.
  • Don’t sleep with a drip. Call your plumber.
  • Signage for a Tire Repair Shop:
    Invite us to your next blowout.
  • Signage for a Maternity Room door:
    “Push. Push. Push.”
  • Signage for a Car Dealership:
    The best way to get back on your feet—miss a car payment.
  • Signage for a Muffler Shop:
    No appointment necessary. We hear you coming.
  • Signage for a Veterinarian’s waiting room:
    Be back in 5 minutes. Sit! Stay!
  • Signage for a Shoe repair store:
    We will heel you
    We will save your sole
    We will even dye for you
  • Signage for an Electric Company:
    We would be delighted if you send in your payment on time
    However, if you don’t, YOU will be de-lighted.
  • Signage for a Restaurant:
    Don’t stand there and be hungry; come on in and get fed up.
  • Signage for a Funeral Home:
    Drive carefully. We’ll wait.
  • Signage for a Propane Filling Station:
    Thank Heaven for little grills.
  • Signage for a Radiator Shop:
    Best place in town to take a leak.

My work here is done. . . .

Trouble in Paradise

Thus, they in mutual accusation spent
The fruitless hours, but neither self-condemning.
And of their vain contest appeared no end. 
                                                            Milton

I remember telling myself, Wow, Eve! The big green snake was scary, but he really talked sense. I ate the fruit and I didn’t die. Anyway, God loves me so much I’m sure one piece of fruit is no big deal for him.

Shortly after we arrived in the park God told us, “Enjoy, celebrate, but don’t eat any fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil or you’ll die.” (Adam and I referred to the tree as “the TKGE.”)

I remember I was so happy strolling over to the vegetable garden, my bare feet sinking into the most, fresh-smelling soil. I asked Adam, “If God loves us, why would he deny us fruit that looks so good?”

Adam says, “I don’t know; he has his reasons, I guess. Maybe it’s a test. Anyway there’re so many other good trees.”

“Yeah, but I wonder if the TKGE fruit looks different. There must be something special about it.”

“Maybe, but I’m busy here with the garden, so let’s talk about it later.”

I decide I’ll walk over and take a good look at it without telling Adam. He would probably try to keep me from going or at least insist on going with me, but he’s always busy tinkering, doesn’t like to be disturbed—besides he’d probably be bored.

I’m walking among the oak, apple and pear trees, glowing orange and purple maple leaves spiraling down in front of me. Then I spot the TKGE. It seems kind of ordinary, really, but with big red fruit. No fence around it or anything. I think, I’ll just walk over and look at it; I won’t touch it.

Then I see a form gliding through the nearby trees, now revealed, now hidden by the leaves.  Smooth, shiny green skin, dark unblinking eyes, looking steadily at me—I’m fascinated. It’s like the dirty parts in a movie—you try not to look, but you do anyway.

I startle when he speaks —“The fruit trees are great, aren’t they? Did God say you can’t eat from any of these trees?”

“Oh no, actually we can eat from all of them, except we can’t even touch that Knowledge Tree there or we’ll die!”

“You won’t die! It’s just that he knows that if you eat it you’ll have great knowledge like he does. He’d rather keep you in the dark. I’ve been around here for a while; I know how these things work. Anyway, you’re special. If God loves you, he wouldn’t want to deny you anything, would he? What’s the point of creating the big red fruit if he didn’t mean for you to eat any?”

His slender head now looms over my shoulder. He seems so logical, trustworthy, the voice of experience. I’m smelling a pungent perfume, feeling the pull of his eyes, and sensing the sweet fruit. I kind of wish Adam were here with me….

All at once, I reach out my hand, grab the fruit, and eat—it explodes sweet in my mouth. I eat the whole thing but, not wanting to litter, I save the core. The snake has disappeared. And I’m not dead! I can’t wait to tell Adam.

I joyously run back to find Adam tilling the kale and Swiss chard. (In those special days, guys ate green, leafy vegetables.) “Adam—I ate the TKGE fruit and look, I didn’t die! We must have misunderstood what God said. It tastes so sweet!”

“O boy! Who’ve you been talking to? Do I have to go everyplace with you?

“Well, you were busy and I was only going to look at it.”

“But what’re we going to tell God? He said don’t eat it.”

“Why did he put it there if he didn’t want us to eat it?”

His face clouds, he hesitates, then suddenly he grabs the core from my hand and eats it. Just like a guy, I think. But is he really hungry? Or just so dependent on me that, realizing I might be kicked out of the park, he wants to be sure he’s kicked out with me?

Now Adam starts looking me up and down—and up and down. I blush. Strange; I’ve never felt self-conscious before. I find some fig leaves and use fibers to sew them together to make loincloths for us. As an afterthought, I sew two extra small round discs for me. We walk deeper into the forest because, for the first time, we just want to be alone.

After a couple of hours I hear God calling out: “Adam, where are you?” (Why doesn’t God call for both of us?) We walk deeper into the forest, playing hide and seek.

God finally catches up with us and says to Adam, “Why are you hiding?”

So my smart husband comes up with a great excuse: “I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.”

God asks, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat the fruit I told you not to eat?”

Adam gets a pained look on his face, immediately confesses, and then passes the buck: “Yep, I did, but this woman that you gave me insisted that I eat it, and you know her—I just couldn’t say no.”

At this point God rolls his eyes, gives up on Adam, and turns to me. I boldly re-pass the buck: “Well, the serpent told me to eat it, and you know weak little me—no sales resistance. Adam wouldn’t come with me—he didn’t even warn me.”

God finds the serpent and tells him the bad news: “Henceforth you’ll be looking at life from shoelace level. And people will step on your head.” The unblinking eyes slink off to disappear into the greenery.

Then he turns to me: “It will hurt you to bear children, and now your husband will be telling you what to do.”

“You mean Adam? How well do you know this man? He can’t even change his mind without consulting me. Can’t follow instructions, no initiative. How could he be my ‘leader?’”

“Well, Eve, you know he’ll be ticked if he isn’t in charge. And even though you have to pretend he’s the leader in public, you can always influence him at home. Trust me; this’ll work.”

“Well, I guess I’ll just have to try to keep Adam from screwing up.”

Then God turns to Adam: “Failure of leadership! Why didn’t you stop her from going? Why didn’t you tell her not to talk to strangers?”

Adam replies,” I’ve tried that before, but you know how hard it is to tell her anything.”

God says, “You thought life was complicated in the garden. But now you’ll have to dig in harder soil, fight sharp thorns and predatory insects and perform sweaty labor. It isn’t going to be a walk in the park.” Adam hung his head and thought about his easy work—the garden vegetables had almost sprung up by themselves.

God replaced our fig-leaf loincloths with the skins of slain animals, kicked us out of the park and posted a guard against our returning. My face turned red when Adam asked God if he could eat the meat. Then he made a fateful decision that influenced all of his male descendants—he promised himself, I’ll never willingly eat green leafy vegetables again. I remember those early “outside” days. We hung on the heavy lattice fence like banished traitors, looking in at the beautiful park we could never again enter. Brambles had breached the fence and the grass inside was browning. I thought, How ungrateful we were; how much we took for granted.

Adam turned to me, “Eve, why did you wander off like that? Anyway, who ever heard of a talking snake? Why didn’t you ask me before you ate the fruit?

“Well, why didn’t you warn me? Why didn’t you put your foot down? Then I never would have gone. Or at least, you should have insisted on going with me. Failure of leadership.”

 “Eve, Didn’t you even stop to think? You knew God had a good reason to prohibit that tree.”

“Well, maybe, but it’s not my fault you ate the fruit that I gave you.”

And so we passed the hours in fruitless arguing.

How was I to know that my simple decision would affect our grandchildren’s grandchildren? That they would only be able to dream about the shining park? They’ll blame us for eating, but I’ll bet they would’ve done the same thing. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

WINGSPREAD for April, 2024


Spreading your wings in a perplexing world
April, 2024                                                    James P. Hurd

Please forward and share this WINGSPREAD Ezine with others. Thank you.

Contents

  • Writer’s Corner
  • Blessed Unbeliever now available
  • New story
  • This month’s puzzler
  • Wingspread Ezine subscription information
  • Wisdom

Writer’s Corner

Tip for writers: You can spin a tale that exists only in your head. But if you’re talking about a historic, known place, character or event, you’d better research it and get your facts right. Most of your readers won’t notice or care, but there’s that one that will find the error, then publish your mistake far and wide on Facebook.

Word of the month: PROP BET. Short for “proposition.” Propping is making a bet on something the bookmakers usually don’t take bets on. For instance, betting on the number of free throws in a basketball game.  

Question for you:  Writing a novel takes writing skill and great research. But it also takes imagination. You must seduce your reader into believing in locations, events or situations that are unusual, spun out of thin air. A favorite example: Charles Dickens tries to convince us that the evil groveler, Uriah Heep, is a believable character. How do you fire up your imagination when you write?

BLESSED UNBELIEVER novel

Blessed Unbeliever (paper or Kindle version) can be found at Wipf and Stock Publishers, Amazon https://a.co/d/9su5F3o or wherever good books are sold.

New story: “Evangelical: What’s in a Word?”

I can’t control what people mean by “evangelical” any more than I can demand that non-English speakers understand my English. A word means what the hearer thinks it means. Meanings of words change. For instance, “gay” used to mean bright and happy, as in “a gay party.” “Cool” used to refer to air temperature. No more. Thus, I can never guarantee other people will accept my parochial definition of “evangelical.” It used to be that people thought a fundamentalist was an evangelical on steroids and an evangelical was a fundamentalist on Prozac No more.. Today, “evangelical” means something quite different. . . .

To read more, click here:  https://jimhurd.com/2024/04/08/evangelicalism-whats-in-a-word/

Leave a comment on the website and share with others. Thanks.

This month’s puzzler

(Thanks to Car Talk archives) Many years ago, one of our producers lived in New York. And he was a two-timing guy; he had two girlfriends.. 

One of the girlfriends lived in Brooklyn and the other lived in the Bronx. 

He could never decide which one to visit. He liked both of them equally and decided that he would just leave it to fate. He knew that when he went down to get the train, he would descend the stairs into the subway and pretty soon a train would come. And if it was the Bronx train, he’d get on the train and go visit the girl in the Bronx. If it was the Brooklyn train, he’d get on and visit the girlfriend in Brooklyn. And what made it great was that the trains ran equally often, every 10 minutes.

So he decided that he would go down to the train at random times during the day or night. He didn’t know the schedules of these trains, but he did know that every 10 minutes there would be a Brooklyn train, and every 10 minutes there would be a Bronx train. He figured his chances are 50/50, either way. 

However, he finds himself going to Brooklyn 9 out of 10 times. Even though the trains run equally, every 10 minutes to each location, and he chooses random times to go down to the train, he ends up 9 out of 10 times going to Brooklyn. 

Why was this happening?

(Answer will appear in next month’s WINGSPREAD newsletter.)

Answer to last month’s puzzler: 

What word has three sets of double letters? And what word has two H’s back to back? There might be a bunch of answers to this one. 

The first one is the word ‘bookkeeper’! b.o.o.k.k.e.e.p.e.r! Love that word. There may be others out there, but this one is the one we were looking for. 

And for the second word, the answer is, ‘withhold’. Two H’s in that word. And I’m sure there are many more out there, especially if people use Google. But these two were the ones we were looking for.

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Wisdom

Strategies of an avid reader

Will Rogers on aging:

First ~ Eventually you will reach a point when you stop lying about your age and start bragging about it.

Second ~ The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for.

Third ~ Some people try to turn back their odometers. Not me; I want people to know why I look this way. I’ve traveled a long way, and some of the roads weren’t paved.

Fourth ~ When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to your youth, think of Algebra.

Fifth ~ You know you are getting old when everything either dries up or leaks.

Sixth ~ I don’t know how I got over the hill without getting to the top.

Seventh ~ One of the many things no one tells you about aging is that it’s such a nice change from being young.

Eighth ~ One must wait until evening to see how splendid the day has been.

Ninth ~ Being young is beautiful, but being old is comfortable and relaxed.

Tenth ~ Long ago, when men cursed and beat the ground with sticks, it was called witchcraft , , , Today it’s called golf.

 Will Rogers, who died in a 1935 plane crash in Alaska with bush pilot Wiley Post, was one of the greatest political country/cowboy sages this country has ever known. Some of his sayings:

1. Never slap a man who’s chewing tobacco.

2. Never kick a cow chip on a hot day.

3. There are two theories to arguing with a woman. Neither works.

4. Never miss a good chance to shut up.

5. Always drink upstream from the herd.

6. If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

7. The quickest way to double your money is to fold it and put it back into your pocket.

8. There are three kinds of men:

The ones that learn by reading. The few who learn by observation.

The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence and find out for themselves.

9. Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.

10. If you’re riding’ ahead of the herd, take a look back every now and then to make sure it’s still there.

11. Lettin’ the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier’n puttin’ it back.

12. After eating an entire bull, a mountain lion felt so good he started roaring.

He kept it up until a hunter came along and shot him.

The moral: When you’re full of bull, keep your mouth shut.

If you wish to unsubscribe from this Wingspread Ezine, send an email to hurd@usfamily.net and put in the subject line: “unsubscribe.” (I won’t feel bad, promise!) Thanks.

Evangelical: What’s in a Word?

I can’t control what people mean by “evangelical” any more than I can demand that non-English speakers understand my English. A word means what the hearer thinks it means. Meanings of words change. For instance, “gay” used to mean bright and happy, as in “a gay party.” “Cool” used to refer to air temperature. In the last few decades, “evangelical” has grown to mean something different. It used to be that people thought a fundamentalist was an evangelical on steroids and an evangelical was a fundamentalist on Prozac No more.

I started out fundamentalist, not evangelical. At Silver Acres church Pastor Cantrell would say, “If you wish to join our church, we’re independent, non-denominational, unaffiliated, Bible believing, pre-millennial, and pre-tribulational.” I thought, if you understood all that, you deserved to be baptized! Two things were important: right belief and right lifestyle. Right belief meant belief in an inerrant Bible. At Silver Acres, a wall-to-wall mural showed scenes of the fantastic beasts of Revelation and the elect (us) flying up to heaven before the world’s tribulation and the coming of the millennial reign. I don’t remember studying Jesus’ Beatitudes; fundamentalists thought these were applicable only in the millennial age. We concentrated more on the epistles.

We fundamentalists soldiered through life separated from the corrupt world, trying to recruit others to our small band. We avoided a select list of behaviors—I didn’t go to a dance until I was 22 years old. Ditto for drinking alcohol or attending a public movie theater. I never even tried smoking. My sister and I watched Spade Cooley smoking on a black and white show and knew he wasn’t a Christian. These prohibitions, not the Beatitudes, guided my behavior and made me feel superior to the worldly folks around me. At the same time, I felt myself a weak outsider to their way of life.

After graduating Moody Bible Institute I attended Cal State Fullerton. My fundamentalist identity didn’t work very well there so I started calling myself evangelical. I sought to make friends with “worldly” people and broadened my tolerance for other Christians—even Catholics.

People used to define an evangelical as “somebody who liked Billy Graham” (even though fundamentalists would criticize him for hanging around with the liberal “modernists”) According to British historian David Bebbington, an evangelical Christian believed in four essential doctrines: 1. A person must have a “born again” conversion experience—hence evangelicals were known as “born-again Christians.” 2. Jesus’ death on the cross atones for humankind’s sins. 3. The Bible is the ultimate spiritual authority. (When you ask, “How does God come to you?” an evangelical is more likely to say, “through the Bible.”) 4. Christians ought to actively share their faith through witnessing and good works.

And yet today most people hearing the word “evangelical” don’t think of pious, separated, sober people who take the Bible seriously. “Evangelical” has fuzzy boundaries. A 2022 comparative survey asked the question, Would you describe yourself as a born again evangelical? Between 15 – 25% of Mormons, Muslims and Catholics answered “yes.” (https://www.graphsaboutreligion.com/p/the-rise-of-the-non-christian-evangelical) Today, some of the people in the following groups self-identify as evangelical: People in historic “mainline” churches (Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, Episcopal and also Catholic). People of other religions such as Islam. Even some people who are atheist or agnostic. What do these people mean by “evangelical?”

Today, for many people,“evangelical” means a certain political persuasion. The conservative evangelical block is the most reliable voting block for right-wing political causes. This block is even rehabilitating the term “Christian nationalism.” To help pay his legal bills, the Republican nominee for President is now hawking the “God Bless the USA” King James Bible ($59.99) which also contains the US Constitution and Declaration of Independence, thus lending bible’s advertising campaign his name, likeness and image.

Today, “evangelical” may refer to people who would vote for anti-abortion laws. They would favor restricting trans people from church leadership and would oppose blessing same-sex couples. Many would oppose D.E.I. (diversity, equity and inclusion) being taught in public schools. All of this seems more political than biblical.

Sadly, the term “evangelical” has been contaminated by right-wing politics and thus has lost its traditional meaning to most people outside the church. Thus, if you wish to identify today as an evangelical Christian (in the traditional sense) you must use a different term!

So, do I call myself an evangelical? If I’m talking to evangelical “insiders” who share the old definition, maybe. But in general I avoid the term with people outside the church. I use “Christ follower” or simply “Christian.” Why? Because if you wish to maintain your true identity you must use the language, not of your grandparents, but of contemporary hearers. To maintain the meaning you must change your words.