June 8, 2015
CHAMPION—June 8, 2015
June is the month for weather just like this. It has been wet and it is humid. Soon it will be the very definition of hot. A few short months ago what we see now as green and verdant was white with brown brush, defoliated tree trunks and some pines and cedars sticking up in it and covered with it. The word of the day was, “Brrrr!” Now every kind of wildflower seems to be blooming and some domesticated plants seem to be blooming for the first time in years. Vegetable gardens are already copiously producing beets and greens, cauliflower and broccoli. Imagine how incredible the place we know every day as ‘home’ must seem to new arrivals. They have entered into a wonderland. Welcome to Champion!
A community work day is scheduled for Friday, June 12th at the Skyline R2 School. This little institution has been serving the community well since the 1950s. It currently has about a hundred local children enrolled from prekindergarten to eighth grade. It is a solid little institution offering all the things a student will need to move forward in the world. Local merchants have donated paint to paint the gymnasium and skilled painters, as well as people who just like to paint, are encouraged to come out and lend a hand with the effort. Bring your brushes and rollers. The work day will start at 8:00 a.m., but there is no time clock for the volunteer. Anytime you arrive will be a good time. For people who would rather work outside, there are landscaping projects, ball field maintenance and the opportunity to explore, tend, and extend the nature trail that heads up between the greenhouse and the outdoor classroom. Bring your rakes, shovels, nippers or any other favorite appropriate tool. The many alumni who live in the area are encouraged to come back to school for a day of fun and accomplishment. Newcomers are invited to get acquainted with the school, the administration and their neighbors as the community comes together in service of the school that is preparing the productive citizens of the future. These future citizens will be running things soon and this is an excellent opportunity to set an example for community service.
Every day is the birthday for a lot of people. The number representing the world population is becoming sizeable. June the 2nd was the birthday of a local archeologist whose recent interesting report on the mitigation phase of the archeological investigation at Lake Gilmer in Texas weighs almost four pounds. Margie Cohen up in Stroudsburg, PA celebrates on June the third. She is a skilled artist in, among other things, yarn, glass, paint, clay, music and life. Wayne Sutherland was 85 years old on June 7th. He is a Champion from way back and has stories to tell that are worth a listen. His wife, Frances, and daughters, Laine and Greta, helped him celebrate. Skyline 7th grader, Destiny Jeffrey also celebrates on the 7th. She will be thirteen. Ms. Powell’s lovely daughter-in-law has her day on the 9th. Skyline student Jacob Shannon will be five on June 10th. Glenn Dylan Ford graduated from Skyline this year. He is off to the 9th grade and will have his 14th birthday on the 13th. Zachary Coon will be a 4th grader in the fall. He enjoys his birthday on June 15th. Foster Emmet Wiseman will be ten years old on the 16th. The years pass quickly as old folks watch the young ones grow up. They can all remember being that young and it did not seem to be that long ago, relatively speaking.
Don Bishop is a frequent visitor at the Historic Emporium over on the North Side of the Square in Downtown Champion. He grew up around these parts but has wound up way over in the general area of Vera Cruz. He lives up on a hill out on Highway 14 somewhere near a big pile of firewood. Last Wednesday at the regular noontime confab he said a while back his wife had gone to town (or somewhere) and he was sitting in the living room reading the paper (or something) when he heard a backfire/gunshot/explosion (or something) out in the kitchen. When he investigated he found that a can of biscuits had been left out on the counter and had blown up. It blew all the way to the ceiling and some biscuits were stuck up there. The rest were all over the place. The incident brought on a number of other biscuit can stories and admonitions to be sure to use them before the expiration date. A certain popular farrier had a bear story to tell that happened around Thornfield somewhere. It sounded like it was going to be an interesting story, but overlapping conversations and fabrications obscured it. Hard- of-hearingness seems to plague persons of a certain age while others just do not seem to be able to defer to another, perhaps more interesting, storyteller. The show-and-tell portion of the confab had another gadget that worked with steam. Dave Partell and Bob Leach were studying it. It was a smallish, cubical thing easily held in the hands, but its purpose was not revealed. Last week a fine pair of silver plated six shooters was on display. Their purpose was clear.
‘Relatively speaking’ is a way to make comparisons. Considering all the difficulties that are present in completing any enormous project, any amount of accomplishment is significant. Expectation is a recipe for disappointment. Haymaking is one of those things. Considering how much rain has fallen, how few dry days in a row, how heavy the hay, the condition of the equipment, the availability of help and a dozen other variables, the quantity and quality of hay that will be put up is wildly unpredictable. So it is in life. One cannot look at a work in progress and estimate the time of completion without knowledge of the capricious nature of the work itself. It is true of people as well. Some people are open books and it is easy to tell how they are–when they have lost at scrabble or won. Others are opaque and may never reveal that they are suffering ill health, disappointment, struggles or grief. It seems that joy is harder to conceal, but knowing what is going on with another person is not necessarily discovered just by looking at him. That is where nonjudgmental compassion comes in—a truly Champion concept.
Compliments came in emails to champion@championnews.us concerning the “continuing genocide of indigenous peoples”. Ms. Ayne Thrope is appalled that Apache holy land may be given away by Congress to a mining company owned by Australia and Britain which will, if they get their hands on it, make an open pit, thousand foot deep mine. She references a song by a well-known Cree songwriter/singer: “Now here you come, bill of sale in your hand and surprise in your eyes that we’re lacking in thanks for the blessing of civilization you’ve brought us, the lessons you taught us, the ruin you brought us, Oh! See what our trust in America’s wrought us!” The give-away is in the form of a rider to a must-pass military funding bill. Opposition to the rider can be voiced to your Congressman. It is said that those who do not learn from history are destined to repeat it. Living in the past is a favorite amusement for some who see their prime to have been back then. Flag Day is coming up on the 14th of the month. The Stars and Stripes will be proudly on display on the wide veranda at the Historic Emporium over on the North Side of the Square across from the monolithic bee tree that shows some small sign of sprouting new growth high up. Champion–Looking on the Bright Side!
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