Everyone has a skill.  Finding and developing it takes work and time.  Or it used to. 

There are still PED-free heroes to be found in the wide world of sports – someone for children, and adults, to look up to.  Please correct me if any of the Mannings were or are into PED’s.  Kevin Durant?  Randy Johnson?  There are plenty of people, not all sports players, which have and will set new standards.  All without PED’s.  But enough.

Hank Aaron, “The Hammer” stated in an interview with USA Today, “…two hundred thousand.  That’s the highest salary I ever made.”  He continued explaining that young players aren’t committed because “…they can make more money in two years than I did in my…career.”

Refusing college football scholarships, baseball was Aaron’s sport of choice.  The year was 1949, Aaron was 15 years old, and he tried out for the Brooklyn Dodgers.  Not making the team, he returned to school.  However, in 1951, Aaron joined the minors, signing with The Negro American League.  In 1952 the team, the Indianapolis Clowns, won The Negro League World Series.  That win produced two offers – one from the New York Giants and one from the Boston Braves.  Aaron chose the Braves, making it to the majors in 1954. 

Desiring to break Babe Ruth’s homerun record amidst the blatant prejudice, Aaron states he’s always believed “…records are made to be broken.”   Threats to himself and his family slowed this desire.  One hit short of breaking the Babes’ record in 1973, Aaron hit his 715^th homerun in 1974, ending the season with 755.

Aaron seems to keep humility as a close friend.  He stated, “The most exciting play in baseball is a triple play…”

Some Stats:

v  1955-1973 hit 24 or more homeruns each year

v  1982 Elected the National Baseball Hall of Fame

v  1997 Hank Aaron Stadium opened In Mobile, AL

v  1999 Ranked 5^th of 100 greatest baseball players in The Sporting News

v  1999 Elected to the Major League Baseball All-Century team

v  2007 Accepted a managerial role with the Atlanta Braves, particularly in minority education

v  2012 Childhood family museum opened at the Hank Aaron Stadium in Mobile, AL.  Stated Aaron at its opening, “This is a truly remarkable remembrance of my family.”                                                                                                                       

Henry Aaron, he’s my kind of hero.

Welcome!

As many stars, grains of sand in a river bed, or waves in the ocean there is an endless supply of subjects from which to write.  Everyone has a story of equal importance.  This blog’s topics will range from wildlife viewing, hunting, fishing, sports, headlines, emergency preparedness, cooking...you get the picture.  It is my desire to have intelligent editorials, prose, poetry, and even a short story.

Note: words may be misspelled according to modern standards but historic quotes are direct.

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Time - that bitter sweet companion of all humans.

I read a book in the 1980’s, albeit I can’t recall the title, about invisible beings who stole time from adults.  Those evil burglars would break into lives of people who were busy working, stressing, and rushing they didn’t notice what was taken from them until it was too late. 

 Immortalizing time in song and script began long before any of us were born into this life:

Ecclesiastes 3:1 “To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under Heaven...”

 “Turn, Turn, Turn (to everything there is a season”) or a variation there of, by the Birds in 1962.

 “TIME! TIME!” The Chamber Brothers in 1968 (Their souls were “psychedelicized”) I love that word!

Now the time has come

There are things to realize
Time has come today
Time has come today

Pink Floyd’s “TIME” off the 1973 album, Dark Side of the Moon

“Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
Fritter and waste the hours in an off-hand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

...You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking

Racing around to come up behind you again”

I would be remiss as a (single) Christian not to mention a most important quote from the scriptures:

Luke 12:42  “...and again when he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, blessed are those servants when he cometh, that he shall find so doing;”

 

I believe the times we are in are necessary to remind all who read this blog and I would be remiss as a citizen of the United States not to mention the Constitution:

"And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the Press, or the rights of Conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms; …"
Samuel Adams   (Samuel Adams was a true revolutionary. He was one of the founders of the Sons of Liberty. His leadership helped organize the Boston Tea Party. He was a delegate to both the First and Second Continental Congresses and fought for the Declaration of Independence. He also helped draft the Articles of Confederation. He helped write the Massachusetts Constitution and became its governor.    americanhistory.about.com)

George Washington, you know, the first president of the United States who fought in both the French and Indian War and the American Revolution:

"Firearms stand next in importance to the constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence … from the hour the Pilgrims landed to the present day, events, occurences and tendencies prove that to ensure peace security and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable … the very atmosphere of firearms anywhere restrains evil interference — they deserve a place of honor with all that's good." cap-n-ball.com 

Does anyone speak with such passion and beauty now? Well, Anne Perry does a fantastic job of it.

 

An interactive poem:

 

Time was so sweet

Hand in hand with unaffected simplicity