Is It Over in Austin?

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The recent series of bombings in Austin — and one in San Antonio — appears to have ended overnight. The suspect blew himself up in the wee hours of the morning, and authorities have expressed confidence that he was, indeed, the serial bomber.

That, of course, is hard to confirm this morning. What can be confirmed — but has not yet been made public, pending notification of the 24–year–old suspect's kin — is the identity of the individual.

It has been reminiscent of the 2001 serial anthrax attacks, which were made through the mail and remain unsolved.

I have also been reminded of the D.C. sniper attacks of 2002 that terrorized the Beltway for three weeks.

Investigators may also know other things that point definitively to his guilt, but the only way for anyone outside of law enforcement to be sure that this reign of terror is over will be if there are no other explosions.

Investigators can't be certain at this point that there are no other bomb–laden packages out there so they are still urging caution. Consequently, I expect folks in Austin — and, given the explosion that occurred in San Antonio a couple of days ago, the rest of Texas — to be on edge for awhile.

It is strong circumstantial evidence that the suspect blew himself up rather than be taken into custody — but, while such evidence carries substantial weight in the court of public opinion, it is far less conclusive in courts of law.

Perhaps authorities have forensic evidence that links the suspect to the bombings. If so, we may learn about this evidence in the days and weeks ahead.

But questions will remain until such evidence is made public.

And some questions may never be answered. For example, the greatest question on the minds of most Texans, I suppose, is "Why did he do this?"

Investigators undoubtedly will speculate about his motivation, but only the suspect himself could provide the answer. Did the suspect have a grudge against someone? Did he want to see how far he could go before authorities caught him?

Sometimes, of course, there is no answer — and that is something with which the people of Austin and the rest of Texas may have to live.

Christmas Musing: Why I Write

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It is early on Christmas morning, and I am awake, but it isn't like it was when I was a kid. I'm not up because I want to find out what is under the tree. I have no tree in my apartment.

Actually, I am up because I have had a touch of some sort of virus lately that has me congested, unable to breathe. So I am awake before sunrise on Christmas morning, like when I was a boy — although, clearly, not for the same reason.

It is cold and clear this morning. The forecasters have said it will be warmer today (but very windy), which would make it one of the milder Christmases I have experienced in Dallas. I didn't grow up here, but I spent most of my Christmases here visiting my grandparents and my parents' old friends, and I have spent most of the Christmases of my adult years here, too.

That doesn't make me an authority on Christmas in Dallas, but it's close! And, more often than not, Christmas in Dallas is cool — even cold at times. I remember a few warm ones when I was growing up, Christmases when my brother and I could go outside and play in shorts and T–shirts. We could climb the pecan trees in my grandmother's yard unencumbered by winter coats.

A couple of times when I was growing up, my family drove to South Padre Island near the U.S.–Mexico border to spend Christmas there, and it was always nice and warm (today, for example, the temperature is supposed to be 71° in Brownsville, close to 80° tomorrow and Saturday).

Anyway, this morning I have been listening to Mannheim Steamroller. I don't know how long they've been putting out Christmas albums — decades, I suppose — but I have one that came out nearly 20 years ago. It is the only purely Christmas album in my collection. I have Christmas songs that various artists have recorded, but they are always part of more general albums.

I remember when I got this album. It was about six months after my mother was killed in a flash flood. I was teaching journalism in Oklahoma and commuting to Dallas on weekends to see about my father. On one of my weekend trips, I heard "Pat a Pan" on the car radio and decided I had to have it. It has been in my collection ever since.

Listening to it really can be an exercise in free association. When I hear it, I think of those days after my mother died, and then I think about her (although I am sure that she never heard this album) — and that leads me to thoughts of my childhood. Mom was my biggest booster, and I am sure she must have encouraged me to take the path I took in life — writing. I have worked at other kinds of jobs, but writing has always been at the core of who I am.

It is a path that has led me to the job I have today as editorial manager for a stock–trading oriented website. I am very happy to have that job on Christmas 2014. Of course, I guess an argument can be made that, after slogging my way through the last six years following the economic implosion, I would be very happy to have any job. And I suppose there is an element of that. But the truth is that I like the people with whom and for whom I work.

Not everyone can say that, and I really am thankful for my job. It allows me to write for a living. I know some professional writers who fret about a lot of things, including writer's block, and writing becomes work for them.

Not me. Writing has always been fun for me. When I have some spare time, I would just about always prefer to write about something. I write three blogs (one of which is this one) so I always have an outlet for any inspiration I may have.

That's what it is. Inspiration. That must have been what my mother encouraged in me when I was little. Mom was about creativity, which has a symbiotic relationship with inspiration. She taught first grade, and I think most of the people who came through her classroom and their parents would tell you she was the most creative teacher they ever knew.

After she died, my family received hundreds of letters from old friends scattered across the country, a few even halfway around the world. One friend who knew her when she was a teenager sent us a letter with some photos of Mom participating in a play in junior high or high school. In the photos, she was clearly hamming it up in her usual way, and the friend remarked in his letter, "I always thought that, if Mary had not gone into teaching, she would have gravitated to the stage."

A career on the stage might have satisfied her yearning for creative outlets. She found other outlets, one of which was encouraging me to write. I had other influences along the way, but I am quite sure she was my earliest. When I was in elementary school, she arranged for me to take piano lessons, which I did for many years. I haven't kept up with it, but all that practice made my fingers quite nimble, and I am sure it contributed to my typing ability, which has been valuable to me all these years. I have certainly found it to be an advantage since personal computers took over the workplace. Many of my colleagues still hunt and peck, but I took typing in junior high and I already had the advantage of several years of piano lessons under my belt.

Of course, typing alone is not the same as writing. Simply stringing words together in grammatically correct sentences is not the same as writing unless you explore related ideas and themes. That is something I have worked on for years, and I really think it has paid off. I have people who read my blogs all over the world. Some sign up as followers who are notified whenever I post something new; others just pop in from time to time to catch up on what I've written.

Occasionally, they write to me. One wrote, "I can't wait to see what you will write about next."

I suppose that sums up how I feel about writing. I often know what I want to write about; I just don't know what I will say about it until I sit down and write.

That is the pleasure I get from writing — discovering what I think or how I feel as a result of writing about it. Sometimes I honestly do not know how I feel about something until I start writing about it. Sometimes, I am as surprised as my readers at what I think.

And it is appropriate to think about that on Christmas — because that is a gift my mother gave me.

Thanks, Mom.

The View From Ground Zero ...

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I remember the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

That was a traumatizing experience for the whole country, but it must have been especially brutal for the folks who lived where those planes did their devastation. In fact, I often wondered, as I watched news reports from New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, what must it feel like to be at ground zero?

Now I think I know.

Well, the casualty rate isn't anywhere near as high as it was on that day — not yet, anyway. And no buildings have been destroyed. Otherwise, though, it seems to be pretty much the same.

I live a few miles east of Dallas' Texas Health Presbyterian hospital. The original Ebola patient didn't come to my apartment complex when he (knowingly? unknowingly? does anyone know for sure?) brought the virus to America ... but he could have. From what I have seen, there is little except geography that separates that apartment complex from the one in which I live or hundreds of others in this city, for that matter. His girlfriend happened to live in a complex that is south of the hospital so that is where he went.

But any of us could have been put at risk. It was just the luck of the draw that we were spared and the other apartment complex was not.

A similar thought must have passed through the minds of many New Yorkers in 2001. Clearly, people died at the World Trade Center simply because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time. Many victims worked there; if one's workplace is targeted, it's really more a matter of time than the luck of the draw for that person, even if that person doesn't know, but in a large facility like the WTC, there are always people on the premises who don't come there every day. They are just there conducting business of some kind. In the North Tower of the World Trade Center, some were eating what turned out to be their last meal in the Windows on the World restaurant at the top of the tower.

Perhaps those who are in the wrong place at the wrong time only plan to be there a few minutes or a few hours, but they get caught in the event.

I was near another ground zero in the 1990s. I was teaching journalism at the University of Oklahoma, which is located in Norman, about 25 miles from Oklahoma City, at the time of the bombing of the federal building there. I was about half an hour from the start of a class when that bomb went off that morning. Some people said they could hear the explosion from that far away. I couldn't. Maybe that was because I was indoors.

Anyway, on that occasion, I had that dodged–a–bullet kind of feeling. I had been to Oklahoma City many times. Frequently I went to do some research at the Oklahoma City library, which was just a few blocks from the federal building. I had walked past the federal building several times.

I thought of those occasions early on, when speculation centered on the possibility that a gas line had blown up or something like that, and I thought, that gas line could have blown up when I was walking past that building. Of course, we know now that it was a bomb — and that a young man named Timothy McVeigh was responsible.

That was the extent of my connection to the federal building.

Many of my students, though, came from Oklahoma City. It was much more personal for them than it was for me, whether they had been to the federal building or not. One of my students, who now works in the Dallas broadcasting media market, lost her father in the bombing.

Even so, I still had that ground zero feeling. There were many people in that building who lost limbs — or lives — simply because they were there, however briefly, for some reason that day.

And, as the unofficial adviser for the newspaper, I was proud of my students for putting their personal feelings aside and producing all their own coverage — their own articles, their own photos, their own graphics — in reporting on a once–in–a–lifetime news event. A journalist must find ways to remain detached from a story, no matter how difficult that may be.

And I know how difficult it was for my students. In addition to unofficially advising the newspaper staff, I was the unofficial counselor for many of them, too.

When you observe from afar, you have no idea how rough it gets, how raw emotions can become at ground zero. Perhaps that is why I hear so many speak so disparagingly of the fears of people here on the front lines — and I am angered and frustrated.

Those of us here at ground zero have never been through anything like this before. We've heard about Ebola, how so many people who get it die, and not long after the original patient died came word that two of the nurses who cared for him were infected. The news sent a wave of fear through this city; we turned to our "leaders" for reassurance, and we encountered what appeared to be an indifferent president — who appointed a political flunky with no medical background to be the Ebola czar — and an equally unconcerned director of the CDC, who could only keep repeating talking points like "we know how Ebola is spread" ad nauseam.

No one to whom I have spoken was the least bit reassured by any of that.

Well, now we're reaching the point where people who were isolated because they came in contact with the original patient have made it through the 21–day incubation period without showing any signs of infection and are free to resume their lives. I hope that continues and that no one else is diagnosed with this disease. Perhaps that will reassure people that it really is difficult to catch this disease, that perhaps we have contained it here.

Because the people who are supposed to reassure us at a time like this have let us down. Big time.

Blaming the Victim

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I've been following politics most of my life.

I understand how the game is played and how one side or the other is apt to use things — appropriately or inappropriately — to score points in political campaigns.

That is how it was with the alleged "war on women" that the Democrats used — admittedly, effectively — against the Republicans in 2012.

Sexism is like racism — in the sense that it really does no good to deny that it exists. Clearly, it does exist — but it isn't the exclusive domain of one political party. That's where propaganda comes in.

To assert that it is the domain of one side or the other renders the accuser no better — indeed, probably worse — than the accused, for the accuser gives in to the very prejudice that supposedly is being decried.

Right here in Dallas recently, we had a blatant example of how sexism is not limited to a particular party — or, for that matter, a particular gender.

A district judge — a Democrat named Jeanine Howard who is unopposed in her bid for re–election this year — issued a ruling in a rape case that was nothing more than a case of old–time victim blaming and shaming. Howard sentenced the defendant, now 20 (18 at the time of the assault), to probation.

"He is not your typical sex offender," she said.

The victim, a 14–year–old girl, "wasn't the victim she claimed to be," Howard said and imposed an incredibly light sentence on the girl's rapist, who had confessed to the crime.

Howard also suggested the crime was not a rape because the victim apparently was not a virgin, that she had been promiscuous and had given birth to a baby. Really. The judge might just as well have said the victim asked for it.

By Howard's logic, any female who has had sexual intercourse cannot possibly be raped — even if she says "no," which, apparently, the victim in this case did. Several times.

(The victim did consent to intercourse away from the school grounds, but the young man attacked her at school.)

Also, the victim and her mother both say she has never been pregnant. Not that that should matter — except, apparently, in Howard's courtroom.

Meanwhile ...

In Montana, an astonishingly lenient sentence for rape handed down by a district judge in that state has been overturned. G. Todd Baugh sentenced a former teacher to one month for raping a 14–year–old student — who later took her own life.

Baugh said the victim was mature for her age and asserted that she was "probably as much in control of the situation" as her attacker.

CNN's Carol Costello wrote an opinion piece on the two cases that was posted on CNN.com (she may have delivered it on the air, too; I seldom watch CNN anymore so I don't know). She wondered — a bit naively, I thought — "Is America really clueless about the meaning of rape?"

I think the answer to that is that a certain portion of America has always been clueless about sexual assault — and probably always will be. Costello never mentioned Howard's political affiliation; the Dallas Morning News did. She never mentioned Baugh's political affiliation, either. I tried to find it, but I couldn't.

Perhaps Montana is one of those states where judicial candidates run nonpartisan campaigns. That really isn't the point, though.

The point is that, regardless of what Americans may have thought would be the outcome of electing the first nonwhite president in the nation's history, a post–partisan America is one of those achievements that is easier said than done.

America has always been a nation of laws, but it is a lot easier to change laws than to change minds. It takes time, and I'm not speaking about the inevitable disappearance of a generation because attitudes tend to be handed down from one generation to the next.

I don't know how old Howard is, but I have seen pictures of her, and I know she isn't of Donald Sterling's generation. Hillary Clinton is much closer, I'm sure, and we heard allegations today from Monica Lewinsky that the former secretary of State blamed the women around her husband — herself included — for the affair.

As long as offenders are given that kind of pass, any improvements in gender relations (and racial relations, for that matter) will be cosmetic at best.

What's Wrong With Voter ID Laws?

I've heard endless arguments about the voter ID laws, especially the one on the books here in Texas, and I must confess that I still don't understand the problem some people have with them.

I mean, what is wrong with proving that you are authorized to vote? You have to present such ID to buy alcohol or cigarettes. You have to present such ID when you apply for a loan or if you're going to rent a vehicle or an apartment — or a motel room.

The vice president has been beating that drum about voter ID laws being racist and fueled by hatred.

I am an independent, and I have found no compelling reason to vote in either party's primary this year (early voting here ends Friday; the primaries are next Tuesday) so I can't speak firsthand about experience with the voter ID law, in effect for the first time.

(Voters in Texas do not register by party so it's largely a personal affiliation kind of thing. When you go to the polls, you are asked in which party's primary you wish to vote.

(If there is a runoff, you can only vote in the party in which you voted in the original primary. But two years later, when the next primaries are held, you can choose the one in which you want to vote all over again. You are not committed to a party beyond the current primary.)

They've been issuing voter ID cards here in Texas for years — new ones are sent out every two years — and voters are supposed to present them when they vote. Now, apparently, additional ID is required as well.

I've heard it said that voter ID laws are racist, that they are intended to prevent minorities from participating.

But here's what it says at VoteTexas.gov:

Here is a list of the acceptable forms of photo ID:

• Texas driver license issued by the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS)
• Texas Election Identification Certificate issued by DPS
• Texas personal identification card issued by DPS
• Texas concealed handgun license issued by DPS
• United States military identification card containing the person's photograph
• United States citizenship certificate containing the person's photograph
• United States passport

With the exception of the U.S. citizenship certificate, the identification must be current or have expired no more than 60 days before being presented for voter qualification at the polling place.

How does that prevent anyone from voting? And if a qualified voter doesn't have any of those, at the top of the website is this sentence: Qualified voters without an approved photo ID may obtain a free Election Identification Card from DPS. Look at the VoteTexas.gov site all you want. It doesn't say anything about literacy tests or any of that other stuff.

And I haven't heard a single report of anyone being denied the right to vote in this primary season. I assume that, if someone had been denied the right to vote, that person would have been worth a lot to the anti–voter ID crowd, which is almost exclusively Democrats (who have been in the political minority in this state for decades) — and, consequently, we would have heard something about it by now. Early voting has been going on for more than a week now. Haven't heard a thing. So again I ask: What's the problem? Before he was elected vice president, before he was elected to the U.S. Senate, Joe Biden was a lawyer, a product of the Syracuse School of Law. He should know that, in the United States, the law requires evidence to prove guilt, that everyone is considered innocent until proven guilty.

Where is his evidence that voter ID laws are racist?

When Christmas Wishes Come True

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I woke early on Christmas morning, perhaps an hour or so before sunrise.

I don't know why I have fallen into this pattern of rising early, but it has been that way of late. It is the only reason why I would be up before dawn on Christmas. I am no longer a child, eager to unwrap my Christmas gifts. I am an adult, living alone. There were no gifts under the tree for me to unwrap. Fact is, there was no tree.

But I was up, and it was Christmas, and that was cause for a little reflection. Good as any, I suppose.

I grew up in Arkansas, but I've spent most of the Christmases of my life here in Dallas. There have been a few exceptions but not many. My parents were born and raised here, and my grandparents lived here when I was a child. My father was a college professor, which meant he was off from his job at roughly the same time my brother and I were off from school so it made sense for the whole family to pack up and head for Dallas and an extended holiday with the grands (grandmothers, mostly — both of my grandfathers were deceased before I turned 10).

A few of the exceptions I mentioned were when I was about 10 or 11 years old. We drove to Dallas on those occasions, too, but we had our family Christmas a couple of days ahead of the actual day, then drove to South Padre Island at the southern tip of Texas where we spent three or four days soaking up the south Texas sun and playing on the beach.

One or two adults traveling in an average vehicle probably could make that trip in eight or nine hours, stopping only for gas, the occasional bathroom break and perhaps a takeout burger. But we were a family of four with two dogs and one of those popup camper/trailer rigs hitched to the car. We frequently stopped along the way, my parents concluded that stopping for sit–down meals rather than takeout was best (it wasn't as potentially messy even though it took longer), and we couldn't really build up a high rate of speed when we were on the road so it usually took us 11 or 12 hours to reach our destination.

For a variety of reasons, we only made this trip about three times. As I recall, the last time we went down there, we arrived in brilliant sunshine and were in high spirits after putting up the camper and preparing to bed down for the night. During the night, though, a heavy rainstorm moved into the area and pounded the area for a couple of days. Finally, my parents decided enough was enough, and we packed up the trailer in the rain and made a beeline for my maternal grandmother's home. As we were making that long drive, we heard the radio report that the storm was the heaviest to strike the area in decades, perhaps a century.

We also heard there were reports of recreational boats lost at sea. That was the last time my family made a trip to South Padre Island.

But I recall that, just before we made our first or second trip to south Texas, I received probably the best Christmas present of my young life — an electric football set. (Actually, it may be better than any Christmas gift I have received since.)

I already had an electric football set. I had wanted one ever since a neighbor and playmate got one a few years earlier, and my parents had given me one, but his was better. It was like the picture shown above, with the players wearing genuine pro football uniforms and helmets, and there was a scoreboard with what appeared to be crowds of fans in the stands.

By comparison, my set was rather bare bones.

My set had no such detail. The players for one team were all red, from their heads to their feet, and the players for the other team were blue, from their heads to their feet. My friend's set looked like it had inch–tall football players, football cards come to life (I was an avid football card collector in those days); mine looked like two teams of plastic figures, no different from the mass–produced plastic green soldiers I played with when I was younger.

There was no scoreboard, either. Well, actually, I think there was something that was supposed to be like a scoreboard, but it was all so generic. My friend's set came with two teams — it was possible to order additional teams, in their home and/or road uniforms —and it had punch–out team names so it was possible to change the name of the team(s) on the scoreboard, too.

When the teams were mailed, the company included tiny sets of numbers that the recipient could apply to the players if desired.

A couple of my playmates had a brother who was about six years older than us, and he had a whole collection of those NFL teams, in their home and away uniforms, on display in his bedroom. He had put numbers on all the players — and not randomly, either. The numbers corresponded with the players who played for the teams.

I remember looking at them from time to time with a sense of awe and wonder.

Looking back on it, there was nothing wrong with the first electric football set I got. It's just that the other was so much better in my eyes. I dutifully played with the first set for a couple of years, but I never got over wanting the one with the authentic–looking players and the scoreboard.

And, when I was about 10 or 11, I finally got it for Christmas.

The teams weren't the hot teams of the day — although they did considerably better in later years — but they looked authentic.

They weren't just red and blue figures.

I think I will always remember that adrenaline rush I felt on Christmas morning (we actually stayed at my grandmother's house for Christmas before embarking on our journey to south Texas that year) when I unwrapped the electric football set. But alas! I couldn't enjoy playing with it yet. The family had to pack up the car for an early departure for South Padre Island that next morning, and most of the Christmas gifts (including my electric football set) had to stay behind.

So, for the next three days, I could only fantasize about playing with my electric football set. For a 10– or 11–year–old boy, it was sheer agony. I thought about that football set while I played on the beach during the day, then I dreamed about it at night.

I don't know if the reality ever lived up to the fantasy, but I know I played with that set for a few years before I tired of it.

Television's First Live Murder

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Fifty years ago, plans were being finalized in Washington for John F. Kennedy's funeral the next day.

Back in Texas, churches in Dallas were holding their usual Sunday services under most unusual circumstances. At Dallas' Northaven Methodist Church, Rev. Bill Holmes gave a sermon that is still talked about half a century later. Holmes told the congregation that Dallas could not avoid its own responsibility for the assassination even if only one man pulled the trigger.

As Holmes spoke, the suspect in Kennedy's assassination, Lee Harvey Oswald, was gunned down while being transferred from police headquarters to Dallas County's jail. The TV networks provided live coverage so some folks who were watching their TVs instead of attending church to pray for the Kennedys saw Oswald get shot by Jack Ruby, a Dallas nightclub owner.

"The killing occurred in the presence of 70 uniformed Dallas policemen," wrote historian William Manchester. "Because NBC was televising the transfer, it was also television's first live murder."

That shooting left a gaping wound in the American experience that probably will never heal.

Because Oswald's death meant some questions will remain unanswered — no matter what kind of evidence is uncovered. There were questions that only Oswald could have answered. Investigators might have been able to establish whether he spoke the truth or not. But without Oswald's testimony — like the forensic evidence that was lost when the limousine was cleaned of blood spatter and John Connally's suit was sent to the dry cleaners — the case will forever remain unresolved.

Nothing that has been uncovered in the last half–century has definitively established the guilt or innocence of anyone.

The killing of Oswald short–circuited the American judicial system. Admittedly, it doesn't always work, but it was the only hope to get Oswald's side of the story. Maybe he would have told the truth. Maybe he wouldn't. That is the kind of thing that juries must decide, and, most of the time, jurors simply have to hope that they have seen and heard enough evidence to reach the right conclusion.

That hope was snuffed out by Ruby, acting as judge, jury and executioner, 50 years ago today — but that is only if one accepts what he said at the time. Conspiracy theorists cite Ruby's organized crime connections and speculate he was sent to rub out Oswald to keep him from talking.

In the words of John Pope of the New Orleans Times–Picayune, Oswald's death "opened the floodgates to a tsunami of speculation about Kennedy's murder." Is it any wonder that JFK conspiracy theories have found a welcome audience from an America still seeking closure for what happened here 50 years ago?

Three previous American presidents had been killed by assassins. The American public managed to achieve closure with two of them when the accused assassins were arrested, charged and eventually convicted. The absence of an assassin to convict, to hold responsible leaves a wound that does not heal easily.

The first presidential assassin, John Wilkes Booth, was killed before he could be brought to trial, which was another supposed link between the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy (a list of such links has been making the rounds almost since the day Kennedy was killed, but many of the items on the list have been discredited). And, to a degree, I suppose, the assassination of Lincoln by a Southern sympathizer led to more than a decade of abuse, known to history as the Reconstruction era. Was that because there was no formal trial for Booth? I don't know.

No one disputed that Booth shot Lincoln. There was a theater full of witnesses who saw Booth leap from Lincoln's box after the shooting. I have heard of no credible witnesses who could identify Oswald as the man who fired at Kennedy from the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository.

"It would have been easier for the American people to accept any enemy, any conspiracy, any plot and then avenge John F. Kennedy," Theodore White wrote. "But what they had to face was an act of unreason, avenged by an individual act of obscenity."

That "act of obscenity" was witnessed by millions and captured on film. There was no doubt about who killed Oswald.

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But doubts about who killed John F. Kennedy have lingered now for half a century.

I believe they will linger forever.

JFK Assassination: Still No Answers

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Today is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I honestly cannot recall any anniversary being as anticipated as this one.

Well, perhaps with the exception of the American bicentennial in 1976 (for consistency's sake, perhaps this should be called the JFK semi–centennial). And maybe it only seems that way to me because I live in Dallas, and the city has been preparing for this anniversary all year (the behind–the–scenes preparations have been going on longer, I'm sure).

I suppose part of the reason it was so anticipated is the sense that, even after 50 years, the Kennedy assassination is an unsolved mystery, a cold case. The Warren Commission concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald alone shot the president, but there were enough loose ends that conspiracy theories flourished, especially after the American public got to see the Zapruder film for the first time.

Doubts persist. A recent Gallup poll shows that more than three–fifths of respondents do not believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. Gallup acknowledged that the number is the lowest in nearly 50 years. What Gallup did not point out is that a majority of Americans accepted the Warren Commission's findings until the Zapruder film became public.

Since then, a solid majority of Americans has believed that Oswald did not act alone — if he acted at all.

By modern standards, I suppose the Zapruder film is almost primitive in its quality. But it is the most detailed visual record of a presidential assassination that we have — and, after they saw it, most people had to conclude that the Warren Commission's findings were not supported by the photographic evidence. By the time the Zapruder film was released (more than three years after it was made), the Kennedy assassination was already regarded as the most photographed assassination ever.

(LIFE.com focuses on a different image, one that sums up the global reaction to what happened here 50 years ago today.)

I hope we never have another attempt on a president's life, but if we do, I have to think that will become the most photographed assassination ever, given the number of cell/camera phones that are sure to be in use.

Today in Dealey Plaza — where the shooting took place — there will be a crowd of people holding tickets for a special program planned to commemorate the exact moment on this day in 1963 when the first shot was fired. As it did on that day in 1963, the day has dawned with rain — but it is considerably colder here today than it was then, and the rain doesn't seem likely to clear by midday.

Regardless of how cold it is, these tickets have been as hot as Willy Wonka's golden tickets, and I'm sure there will be few if any no–shows. A monument commemorating the assassination will be unveiled at that time (an "X" already marks the spot in the street where Kennedy suffered the fatal head wound). My understanding is that the program will be televised locally. Portions of it will almost certainly be shown on the national newscasts tonight.

It seems that so much has been said and written about the Kennedy assassination that almost nothing more could possibly be said, but the 50th anniversary is an invitation for all kinds of things — even if they aren't entirely relevant, such as Professor Nicholas Burns' piece in the Boston Globe on the three lessons of the Kennedy presidency (which is a separate topic from his death — as it is and should be for all presidents — and would be a dandy topic on the 100th anniversary of Kennedy's birth, which will be in less than four years but isn't necessarily appropriate on this occasion).

Relevance (or lack thereof) hasn't kept publications like the Los Angeles Times and others from running eyewitness accounts that are interesting but really add nothing to public knowledge of what happened.

For that matter, we know what happened. We continue to obsess over the who (which is also irrelevant). We're still asking the same questions. United Press International, for example, ran a piece a few days ago wondering who was responsible for the assassination.

Such things are to be expected, I suppose, but it has always struck me as inexcusable that so much time and energy should be wasted on speculating about who was responsible without determining why Kennedy was killed. I am certainly not a criminal investigator, but it seems to me that, if you answer the why, the rest should fall into place.

Larry Sabato, of whom I have written here before, wrote last week about five persistent myths about Kennedy. Most, like his points that the 1960 Nixon–Kennedy debates did not propel Kennedy to victory in the election that year or that JFK was not the liberal he is perceived to have been, come as no surprise to anyone with an interest in history.

Likewise, Tricia Escobedo's piece for CNN.com purports to tell readers five things they don't know about the assassination.

But I've been studying the assassination for a long time, and I knew that Oswald wasn't arrested for killing Kennedy. I also knew that the TV networks suspended all other programming for four days to report exclusively on the assassination and related events. And I knew that Judge Sarah Hughes, who swore in Lyndon Johnson on board Air Force One that afternoon, was the first woman to swear in a president.

I also knew that, earlier in 1963, Oswald tried to kill General Edwin Walker, a critic of the Kennedy administration and integration, while Walker was inside his home.

I'm not sure, though, that I knew that assassinating a president was not a federal offense in 1963. Interesting to know — at least from an historian's perspective — but of no real value when trying to answer the still unanswered questions.

Fred Kaplan of Slate.com, a onetime believer in conspiracy theories, recently devoted his energies to debunking them even though he acknowledged that "[t]here's no space to launch a full rebuttal" — apparently not even in cyberspace.

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For a long time, whenever the Kennedy assassination has been the topic of conversation, the focus has been on whether it was the result of a conspiracy and who really fired the fatal shot.

America should have been asking why, not who. After half a century, I think it is too late.

Death at Six Flags

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A Dallas woman was killed while riding a roller coaster at Six Flags Over Texas last Friday evening.

The investigation into the case is ongoing, and I prefer not to jump to any conclusions before all the facts are in, but it sounds like the woman's safety belt was not fastened correctly.

I have rarely been to Six Flags Over Texas — only once, in fact, since the Texas Giant, the ride on which the incident occurred, made its debut — and I do not know what kind of security precautions are in use on that or any other ride today. Seems to me that the last time I was there, people were held in place by some kind of metal bar, but published reports today suggest that something akin to a seat belt is in use now.

A photograph I found on the internet (at right) seems to show some kind of modified bar with some sort of padding around it, perhaps to protect the park goers from the bar.

Maybe there were too many complaints about how hot those bars were in the summertime. I don't know.

What I do know is that witnesses said the woman tried to tell whoever it was who seated her and fastened her safety apparatus that she wasn't secured correctly. The attendant's behavior was described as nonchalant, kind of dismissive.

Reportedly, it was her first trip to Six Flags, but she apparently knew enough about the ride's security features — perhaps from watching others while standing in line — to know that something was not right.

The woman who died was named Rosy Esparza. She lived in Dallas. I don't know how old she was or how many children she had. According to reports, two of her children were on the ride with her, and they were, as you might expect, in hysterics when the ride came to a stop, and they tried frantically to get someone's attention.

By the time their mother was located, it was not possible to resuscitate her — if it ever was. The Texas Giant has been known as the tallest wood–steel hybrid roller coaster in the world, more than 150 feet tall. That's roughly the height of a 14–story building.

It's hard to imagine a height from which a person could be thrown from the ride and be expected to survive.

Ever since I heard about all this, I have been thinking about the last time I went to Six Flags. It was right after I had moved to this area, and some friends of mine came to visit me from Little Rock. One of my friends, Mike, was an absolute nut about roller coasters. The three of us went to Six Flags one day, and Mike made a beeline for the first roller coaster he spotted.

And, I swear, he rode that ride over and over and over again — must have ridden it 10 or 12 times before he had finally had his fill (temporarily). My other friend, Steve, and I sat on a bench near the ride and watched him in utter amazement. After about the third or fourth time, we started joking about Mike and his infatuation with roller coasters.

He wasn't riding the Texas Giant. The Texas Giant didn't exist yet. But I have been thinking of that day so long ago — and wondered what I would have done if I had seen my friend get thrown from a roller coaster.

Roller coasters, of course, appeal to thrill seekers, but always in the backs of their minds is the assurance that roller coasters really are safe, that they are fast and exhilarating but not really dangerous.

For the most part, that's true. Friday's fatality was only the park's second in more than half a century of operation. And the website for the national organization of amusement parks has been running a message reminding people that the chances of anyone being killed while riding a roller coaster are extremely slim.

But, no matter how slim that chance may be, the fact is that there is that chance. It is not impossible, and no one seems to be pretending that it is — unlike the promoters of the Titanic a century ago.

It is my hope, however, that the investigation will be thorough, that no shortcuts will be taken. Public safety should be the top concern — if not the only one.

Certainly, if there was negligence on the part of anyone on Six Flags' staff, it should be uncovered. But that is not the only thing that investigators should seek.

If there is any kind of problem that caused this and can be corrected, it should be identified and corrective measures should be suggested.

Blame is not the only thing that needs to come from this.

Born With a Silver Foot in His Mouth

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"I'm a grandmother now. And I have one nearly perfect granddaughter named Lily. And when I hold that grandbaby, I feel the continuity of life that unites us, that binds generation to generation, that ties us with each other. ... And as I look at Lily, I know that it is within families that we learn both the need to respect individual human dignity and to work together for our common good. Within our families, within our nation, it is the same."

Ann Richards
July 18, 1988

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It was on this night 25 years ago that I first heard of Ann Richards.

That was probably true of most Americans who lived outside Texas, and, frankly, I expected most Americans to be oblivious to things that were happening in Texas, but I really felt that didn't apply to me.

You see, Texas was always a second home to me when I was growing up. It is where my grandparents lived, and my family came here two, three, sometimes four times a year. When we were here, I read the local papers. I watched the evening news. I listened to the adults' conversations about current events. I always felt like I was on top of what was happening in Texas.

Then, after I finished work on my bachelor's degree and began working for newspapers in Arkansas, my parents returned to Texas, and I continued to visit the state two, three, even four times a year.

I believed I had been keeping up with developments in Texas pretty well — until this night in 1988. That was when I realized that I really didn't know as much about what was going on here as I thought.

It was on this night in 1988 that Richards delivered the keynote address at the Democratic convention. She was the two–term state treasurer in Texas, and word was that she was planning to run for governor in 1990. The keynote address was intended to give her some additional exposure in her buildup for the campaign.

This was of interest to me because, by mid–July of 1988, I had made the decision to move to Texas and work on my master's degree at the University of North Texas. If Ann Richards was going to be a candidate for governor, I decided, I wanted to see her in the national spotlight. It would tell me a lot about her ability to handle pressure.

What did I think?

Well, I thought it was one of the finest convention speeches I have ever heard. There were a couple of times when Richards appeared a little shaky, a little nervous, but she shook it off and, more often than not, delivered an effective zinger.

Like this one about patrician (and somewhat gaffe–prone) Vice President George H.W. Bush: "Poor George, he can't help it. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."

Only Richards — who earlier told her audience she was especially happy to be speaking that night "because after listening to George Bush all these years, I figured you needed to know what a real Texas accent sounds like" — pronounced the word help as "hep."

And can't became "cain't" when Richards spoke.

Take it from me. That is authentic Texan.

It was an important speech, more crucial to Richards' political career than it was to the success of the Democratic ticket that year. But, looking back on it, I am struck by how much her complaints about the incumbent administration sound like the complaints from subsequent keynote speakers in both parties — and, consequently, both by how much and how little has changed in the last quarter of a century.

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"They've tried to put us into compartments and separate us from each other. Their political theory is 'divide and conquer.' They've suggested time and time again that what is of interest to one group of Americans is not of interest to anyone else. We've been isolated. We've been lumped into that sad phraseology called 'special interests.' "

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Richards was a true Texan. She reminded me of my mother, who was a native Texan as well, and she used the kind of phrases my mother used — such as "tell how the cow ate the cabbage."

(I'm not sure of the origin of that one, incidentally. I can say only two things: 1, I believe it began as a Southern expression although it may be in use in other regions as well, and 2, based on how my mother used it, I concluded that it means the speaker is telling the absolute truth about something.)

I liked Richards' plain–spoken nature. She kind of seemed like a female Harry Truman, someone who wasn't afraid to say what she believed. She was blunt. She just wasn't as salty as he could be.

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When she ran for governor a couple of years later, she was elected. I was proud to vote for her. I wasn't living in Texas when she sought a second term and lost (to George W. Bush) in the Republican wave of 1994, but I would have voted for her again.

All of that was still in the future on this night 25 years ago. In 1988, Ann Richards spoke to a TV audience in the millions with poise and charm. If she was nervous, she didn't show it. And she had plenty to be nervous about. She was only the second woman to give a keynote address at a Democratic convention, as she herself observed.

(In so doing, she borrowed a six–year–old line from a comic strip — "Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels!")

There was a real honesty in her words, the kind of honesty we could use today.

"[W]hen we get our questions asked, or there is a leak or an investigation," she said of the incumbent administration, "the only answer we get is, 'I don't know,' or 'I forgot.'

"But you wouldn't accept that answer from your children," she said with a sly grin. "I wouldn't. 'Don't tell me you don't know or you forgot."

(That's the kind of response I could have expected from my mother if I tried to get away with saying I didn't remember or I forgot something.)

Then she cut to the chase. "We're not going to have the America that we want until we elect leaders who are going to tell the truth; not most days but every day; leaders who don't forget what they don't want to remember."

When she spoke, she had the same kind of character that all the women in my family had. She said that she was glad the young people of that time didn't have to experience the hardship and sacrifice of the Depression and World War II. It was the kind of thing I could hear my own mother or my grandmothers say, and I agreed with her; I, too, was glad that most of the people who were under 50 at that time had no memory of those things.

"But I do regret that they missed the leaders that I knew," she said, "leaders who told us when things were tough and that we'd have to sacrifice and that these difficulties might last for awhile. They didn't tell us things were hard for us because we were different or isolated or special interests. They brought us together, and they gave us a sense of national purpose."

I'm sorry we missed those leaders, too.

The Charlie Brown Syndrome

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I've been watching the weather forecasts unusually closely lately because those of us here in north Texas appear to be on the cusp of an important — and, for most of us, welcome — shift.

I'm speaking of nature's seemingly endless grip of triple–digit temperature readings we've had in this area this summer.

Now, it's been a scorcher across most of the country this summer, as it usually is — and it is always hot in Texas — but the summer of 2011 has been one of those truly extreme summers — like the ones in 1980 and 1998 — that people talk about for years.

Almost without exception, our temperatures this summer have been over 100° every day for more than two months. In Texas, we expect to see some 100° temperatures each summer. But not dozens of them.

There have been a few days when the temperature didn't make it to 100° — and only once, I believe, when it was significantly below 100° — but, most of the time, it has been like a cruel game of bait and switch.

The "bait," in this case, has been the occasional prediction of a daytime high that fell short of 100° or a night–time low that dropped below 80°. The forecasters start speaking of this glimmer of hope about a week ahead of time, when it first appears on the computer models, but the closer we get to the day when it is supposed to happen, the farther back the forecasters push the line until there is nothing left.

That's the "switch," and I have started thinking of it as the Charlie Brown Syndrome.

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If you're old enough to remember the "Peanuts" comic strip, it's like those periodic strips when Lucy would con Charlie Brown into trying to kick the football. She insisted that she would hold the ball for him, but, when he agreed to kick it and came running to kick it, she pulled it away at the last second, and he fell flat on his back.

And, as Charlie Brown lay there, flat on his back, Lucy would come up to him with some sort of punchline. Usually, whatever she said managed to both justify her decision to pull the ball away from him just before he could kick it and contradict the argument she had made to convince him — against his better judgment — to try to kick it in the first place.

You always knew what was coming when you saw Lucy with a football. It was a running gag — and a generally harmless one, too (except as far as Charlie Brown was concerned).

Maybe that is what has been so insidious about these sub–100° forecasts. It's been like Lucy's trickery with the football, but it hasn't been harmless.

People have died in the heat wave of 2011, as they do in every heat wave. Utility bills have gone through the roof, adding stress to already overextended household budgets.

There's been some relief in other parts of the country, but Texas has been waiting — not always patiently but waiting nevertheless. And our deliverance may be at hand. Finally.

For about a week, people around here have been told that a cool front is on its way and will bring temperatures down this week.

Yesterday, as usual, temperatures exceeded 100°, but it was 75° when I got up this morning, and it is supposed to be right around 90° for today's high. That's better than it has been, but not where I would like it to be.

Tonight, the forecasters tell us, we will see, temperatures dipping into the low 60s, possibly the upper 50s. We haven't heard those words in four or five months, and we have good reason to be skeptical. But the forecast suggests that this is what we can expect all week — along with temperatures in the 80s — and they haven't been pushing the line back as we have gotten closer to this, our transition day.

The forecasters are predicting a high temperature tomorrow that is lower than the temperature as I write this at 8 a.m. on Sunday. It is currently 86°, and the forecasters say it won't get above 83° tomorrow.

We'll see.

Half a Century of Six Flags

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It isn't unusual these days to see a "Six Flags" amusement park in several places across this country — from coast to coast.

You'll even find them in foreign countries.

Some have always been "Six Flags" parks. Others began their existences with other names and under different management, but they were later absorbed into the "Six Flags" corporation. In all, there have been nearly three dozen "Six Flags" amusement parks.

But the very first one opened to the public 50 years ago on this date in Arlington, Texas, about 25 miles west of where I live today. It officially opened for business on Aug. 5, 1961 (the day after Barack Obama was born).

That theme park was known then — and it's still known — as "Six Flags Over Texas," a name it took from the fact that six different nations ruled Texas in its history — Spain, France, the Confederacy, Mexico, the Republic of Texas and the United States.

It was modeled after Disneyland's concept of dividing the park into several sub–sections (theme parks within a theme park, you might say) — but Disney focused more on general themes like Adventureland, Fantasyland, Tomorrowland.

My grandparents lived in Dallas, and my family visited them often when I was growing up. Outside of the Texas State Fair, there really wasn't much to bring families to Dallas when my parents were children, and I don't think things were all that different before I was born, but "Six Flags Over Texas" changed that.

My mother and my grandmother could hardly wait until I was old enough to take to "Six Flags," which was constantly adding new things in the 1960s and 1970s. When the day finally arrived that we went to "Six Flags," I think they were more excited about it than I was.

And, after they took me the first time, it became a regular thing for us every summer.

(Incidentally, although its primary days of operation have always been from late spring to autumn, "Six Flags" is open for seasonal events today, like its annual Spring Break kickoff, which got started in the 1980s, and its Christmas programs.

(I can't remember if it was open during the Christmas holidays when I was a child. We didn't pay attention. We were busy with other things.)

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I loved the rides — some more than others — and I loved the food. And, on especially hot days, I loved the cool of the park's theaters, where song–and–dance shows (often featuring area college students as performers) were repeated frequently every day.

It really was a wonderful combination of entertainment and a crash course in history. As a child, I was attracted by all the things that attract children, but, in hindsight, I have often wondered if maybe the seeds of my interest in history were planted on those day trips to "Six Flags" — an interest that, I am confident, led me to study journalism in college.

Sure, there were the kinds of rides you expect to find at an amusement park. There were roller coasters and bumper cars and a miniature train that went all the way around the park, but there were also several theme–specific rides.

(I remember that the Oil Derrick Tower, which represented the 20th century oil boom in Texas, was the first thing you could see as you approached the amusement park from any direction, looming as it did high above everything else.

(It was visible for miles along that relatively flat terrain, and it was the landmark I watched for — because I knew, when I saw it, that it was really happening. It wasn't an abstract concept.

(I've only been to Disneyland once, and I was a teenager when I did that, but I presume that is how kids feel when they catch their first glimpse of Sleeping Beauty's Castle.)

Many of the rides featured guides who provided an historical narration. OK, sometimes it was modified a little to give the guests more of a sense of being in the moment — a little jam on the bread, as Andy Griffith said once on his TV show.

Sometimes, as I say, the narrators took a little poetic license, but that was all right. The stories they told — to borrow a line from Mark Twain — were mostly true.

And I wasn't going to quibble — because I was only a kid, and I was having fun the way kids do.

I never stopped to think about how the tour guides' stories might be subtly influencing how I thought and what I knew — or what I thought I knew.

But they did — in ways I am still discovering. Even today, when I'm watching, say, The History Channel and something is said that contradicts something I heard in one of those narratives, I do a kind of mental double take.

I don't mind, though. I had fun, and I am thankful for the memories — and whatever actual knowledge I picked up along the way.

How Hot Is It?

It's been nearly 20 years since Johnny Carson left The Tonight Show, but, if you can remember when he was the show's host, you can probably remember many of his ongoing routines.

I'm thinking of one in particular that was usually likely to surface during Carson's monologue, but it could happen at any time. It frequently popped up when something really extreme had been happening — for example, a lot more (or a lot less, for that matter) rain than usual.

He would say something like, "It was so wet (or dry) today that ..." and, before he could finish the joke, the audience would roar as one, "How wet (or dry) was it?"

As I say, it could be anything extreme — or anything, at least, that was perceived to be extreme. It could be "Dan Quayle is so dumb" or "Al Gore is so wooden."

Weather was always a good source, but it could be anything. Carson and his writers could be very creative at times.

(All together now — How creative were they?)

Lately, as the nation has been enduring the kind of heat wave that usually seems to be reserved only for Texas, I've been missing Carson.

Well, actually, as far as I am concerned, late night TV has never been the same since he left — so missing Carson is not a new thing for me — but, when there's something in progress like this heat wave, I really miss him.

These times cry out for an opportunity for heat–weary people to shout in unison, "How hot is it?"

Jacy Marmaduke of the Dallas Morning News has been keeping area residents advised as local temperatures have cracked triple digits daily for four straight weeks now.

Recently, this summer's heat wave claimed the second slot on the historical list. It overtook the summer of 1998 a few days ago.

I was living in Dallas in the summer of 1998, and that was, indeed, a brutal summer. I was working for a trade magazine and I had to cover a trade show in Chicago that July. While I was there, I encountered quite a few people who had come from places to the north — and some were complaining of the heat.

Personally, I didn't find the heat in Chicago nearly as severe as the weather I had just left. The difference was noticeable upon my return.

I don't think that would be true this summer. Nearly the entire country has been sweltering. It's been easing lately in places where it usually doesn't get that hot, but much of the country remains in the heat wave's grip.

Depending upon the cloud cover we have, our streak of triple–digit days may come to an end around here tomorrow — but, even if it does, the immediate forecast suggests that a brand–new streak is likely to begin on Sunday, and that one seems certain to continue for awhile.

Besides, as a meteorologist told Marmaduke, there isn't much difference between 99° and 100°. The difference is almost entirely psychological.

If the streak does not end tomorrow, the summer of 2011 may well go down as the hottest on record — at least in terms of consecutive 100° days.

To accomplish that, it will have to exceed the triple–digit streak of 1980 — and it just might do that, but it will never match the intensity of the summer of 1980.

I remember that one, too.

I wasn't living in Dallas in those days, but my grandmother was, and I remember coming here with my mother to visit my grandmother, who was starting to experience symptoms of dementia.

Daytime highs in 1980 seemed to get past 100° before noon and just kept climbing through the afternoon. I remember several days when temperatures flirted with 110° (the worst actually exceeded 110° a few times) — and I remember driving on the streets of Dallas and hearing the asphalt squish beneath the tires.

In 1980, a daytime high of only 100° was seen by some as a sign of an imminent cool front (it never was, but hope sprang eternal. Those triple–digit temperatures were daily facts of life for more than six weeks).

Needless to say, you could do a lot more than fry an egg on the pavement.

This summer's heat wave has been a scorcher, but the summer of 1980 (if it possessed human characteristics) would scoff. I can just imagine the things it would say. "Amateur!" it would sneer. "In my day, I gave 'em heat they're still talking about three decades later."

If some have their way, though, that consecutive triple–digit streak will tumble, and the summer of 2011 will be atop the list when all is said and done.

Marmaduke quotes a 15–year–old from Plano who wants a streak he can tell his grandkids about.

All I can say is, be careful what you wish for.

There Will Come Soft Rains

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"There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pool singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence–wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly;
And Spring herself when she woke at dawn
Would scarcely know that we were gone."

Sara Teasdale
(1884–1933)

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Yesterday was another 100–plus–degree day here in Dallas.

I don't know how many straight days of this we have had. I'm sure we've cracked the old century mark every day in July, and the streak probably goes back to the last few days of June.

How long will it continue? I don't know. I check the NOAA website every day, and the last time I looked at it, the temperatures in this area were supposed to be in triple digits at least until this time next week. NOAA's forecasts don't go beyond a week — and Texas weather is notorious for changing without notice — so it may well be weeks before we see our next sub–100° day around here.

I've heard that, statistically, this is just a typical summer in north Texas, and I've lived through enough Texas summers in my life to know that there is a certain amount of truth in that. It's been common knowledge for a long time that it gets really hot here. The average temperatures in July and August are in the mid–90s, but it isn't uncommon for the temperature to exceed 100°.

Every summer, in fact — and often in the spring and autumn months, too — I am frequently reminded of one of my favorite quotations. It came from Union Gen. Phil Sheridan, who is remembered in the history books for his march to the sea, during which he burned the city of Atlanta (an event that was vividly re–created in "Gone With the Wind").

For a time before the Civil War, Sheridan was assigned to a fort in Texas along the Rio Grande. The experience of living here prompted him to say, "If I owned hell and Texas, I would rent out Texas and live in hell."

Sheridan, of course, lived here long before the invention of air conditioning, but I have encountered no disagreement with him among people who have lived here since A/C came along. If anything, those who live here today tend to resent the way they think the utility companies take advantage of heat waves like the one we've been experiencing this summer.

Air conditioning is a necessary evil here, especially when it is as hot as it has been lately. We are constantly reminded that heat is responsible for more deaths around here than any other meteorological cause. Makes sense. There's always more of it.

Anyway, to protect ourselves from the heat, we must run the air conditioning. We have no choice — and, when the daytime highs exceed 100° and the nighttime lows don't even go below 80°, the air conditioning seems to run ceaselessly.

And that leads to incredibly high utility bills — which are never welcome, especially at a time when gas prices are still well over $3/gallon.

But it will end ... eventually.

It was that thought that reminded me of Teasdale's poem from the collection titled "Flame and Shadow" that was published in 1920.

Well, I thought of the title of the poem more than the poem itself — because the poem itself speaks of a post–apocalyptic war world in which humanity has been destroyed and nature starts to reclaim the planet.

I'll grant you, scorched earth might be a good description of this place when the heat wave finally does subside — but that's the point. It will subside.

The temperature will drop — and cool, soft rains will return.

Someday. Maybe soon. Maybe not. But someday.

A Tale of Two News Stories

For many years, I worked as a writer and/or editor for newspapers and a trade magazine.

In fact, one of my standing assignments for awhile was to write a weekly column about events that were coming up. That column was titled, "The Week Ahead." In that column, I told readers about things that were coming up.

I didn't confine myself to the county in which I lived and worked. I wrote about events that were scheduled in just about every part of Arkansas. I know it is difficult for natives of a place like Texas to understand, but, unless the weather is bad, just about any place in Arkansas is easily within a day's drive of any other place in Arkansas.

It was a unique job. Part of it was spent writing about things that had just happened — and part of it was spent focusing on things that were still in the future.

There were lots of dramatic moments during my years in print media — moments that often defined who we were — but I don't think I have ever witnessed a week like the one just past.

I hope I never go through one like it again, either — and I wasn't even part of the professional news media as this week played out — but I'm not sure what could be done to prevent it.

The week began innocently enough, I suppose, with the annual celebration of the Fourth of July. From my balcony, I was able to watch two or three fireworks shows that evening (when one is gazing into the dark horizon, I have found that it is hard to determine where one such show ends and another begins).

In hindsight, that was the proverbial calm before the storm.

The next day, all hell broke loose. In Florida, Casey Anthony was acquitted of killing her young daughter, and an anguished wail rose from coast to coast.

My impression, from the beginning, was that women more than men felt the sting of the verdict. I'm not saying that men weren't affected by it, too; some clearly were. But I heard and read far more quotes from women about it, and I saw far more women participating in protests against the verdict. And I have seen frequent posts about it on Facebook — again, mostly (but not exclusively) from women.

I think the verdict — whether it was the right one or not — cuts deeply against the grain of the protective maternal instinct.

As a young general assignment reporter covering murder trials for a newspaper in central Arkansas, I realized that the duty of an effective attorney is to present a plausible case in court. A prosecutor wants to win a conviction; a defender wants to win an acquittal. Toward those ends, they will construct arguments that benefit them the most.

While I did not watch the entire Anthony trial, it seems to me the prosecution was successful in offering an argument that women in particular found acceptable.

The members of the jury apparently did not feel that the prosecution met the law's requirements, though. I've heard a few jurors say, in recent days, that they wished the prosecution had given them the evidence they needed to convict — because many, apparently, believed the prosecution was right.

In their eyes, however, the evidence just wasn't there.

Every time I switched on my TV on Wednesday or Thursday, I saw someone talking about the verdict. Aware of the public's notoriously short attention span, I wondered what would seize its imagination next. I didn't have to wait long to find out.

On Thursday evening, about 25 miles from where I sit writing this, a firefighter from central Texas who brought his 6–year–old son to this area to see a Texas Rangers baseball game lost his balance reaching for a baseball and fell 20 feet to his death.

In the aftermath of that tragedy, I have heard of the special bond that existed between this man and his son, how they shared a passion for baseball and how they stopped on their way to the ballpark to get a baseball glove, hoping to catch a foul ball to keep as a souvenir of their special day together.

I think this story has reverberated with men because it has been my experience that most men really treasure these times with their children. Perhaps it is because I share their gender, but I think a lot of fathers resent the stereotype impression society has of abusive, distant or deadbeat dads.

Now, it is true that there are abusive, distant or deadbeat dads — more than I would like to acknowledge — but my experience is that the majority of fathers are dedicated to their children. They just don't get many opportunities to show it.

Most fathers miss out on the day–to–day stuff, not because they aren't interested but because they are busy with the jobs that put food on the table and keep a roof over their children's heads. Meeting one's obligations can be a lonely business.

It is more common for women to work outside the home now than it was when I was growing up, but my guess is that it is still the mothers (primarily) who put band–aids on skinned knees and provide milk and cookies after school. My guess is that they still do the prep work for birthday parties and have heart–to–heart talks. They just do it all a few hours later than they used to.

For fathers, a baseball game is a rare opportunity to share something with their children — and it really is the kind of thing that creates memories that last a lifetime. (There was a lot of truth in what the little girl said in "Field of Dreams" about adults being drawn to that Iowa field by the lure of memories.)

I still remember the night my family went to a major league game for the first time. It was in St. Louis, which was a day's drive from my hometown. My parents wanted to visit friends who were scattered along the eastern half of the continent, but we made the first stop on our road trip in St. Louis, where we knew no one, checked into a Holiday Inn near Busch Memorial Stadium and went to see the Cardinals play their rivals, the Chicago Cubs.

It was not a good evening for the Cardinals. The Cubs won, 12–0. It wasn't too bad early on. Neither team scored through the first four innings, then the Cubs scored twice in the fifth. That wasn't so bad. Going into the seventh, it was still only 2–0.

But then the roof fell in. Chicago scored 10 runs in that seventh inning, most after the Cubs had two outs.

You can look at the box score if you want to see how truly terrible it was. What I remember is sitting next to my father and watching run after run score — and, with each run, more of the fans around us got up to leave.

I don't think my father has ever been much of a baseball fan, but I was an avid collector of baseball cards in those days, and most of the kids I knew were Cardinals fans. Like most kids, I craved acceptance so, at that time in my life, I guess you could say I was a Cardinals fan, too.

Anyway, that game didn't turn out to be much fun for me. I remember looking at my father when the Cubs scored one of those runs in the seventh. He smiled and chuckled, then put his arm around me and held me next to him for a few seconds.

"Not much fun, is it?" he asked. I remember shaking my head. "Want to go back to the motel?" I nodded.

So we all got up — except for my brother, who had dozed off in his seat — and my father picked up my brother and carried him all the way to the car. I don't think he ever woke up.

On our way out of the ballpark, though, we stopped at a souvenir stand so I could get a cap. I wore that cap nearly every day — and almost constantly on weekends — for a couple of years, not because it was a reminder of a remarkable game but because it was a reminder of a rare evening with my father.

When I was a kid, I didn't see much of my father. He taught at a local college. He often left the house before I got up in the morning and usually returned either just before or after I went to bed at night. My mother was the one who observed the early milestones of my life.

Dad always attended school functions and things like that, but he was usually busy during the days. I didn't hold it against him. That was just the way it was — not just for me but for everyone I knew.

That night in Busch Stadium was special for me, and it remains special to this day. I believe that memories of similar experiences have made what happened in Arlington the other night so poignant for so many men. It cuts against the grain of the father–child relationship that they cherish.

No father wants his child to witness a horrifying accident like that — or to have an eagerly anticipated trip to a baseball game end with that child riding in the ambulance that carries his dying father from a ballpark to the hospital.

I think the two stories that have dominated the news for the last week have been chilling to both genders more for what they represent than what they actually are.

Guilty people sometimes go free, and loving parents sometimes die. We know that. But these two cases were special.

Casey Anthony is believed by many to have violated what may be the most sacred trust in humanity — the one that exists between a mother and her child.

And Shannon Stone died because he selflessly tried to catch a baseball to give to his son as a souvenir.

It all seems like a waste, doesn't it?

Independence Days Past

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I am feeling nostalgic this Fourth of July.

Not surprisingly, I suppose, it has been my experience that people tend to feel nostalgic if they believe their lives are lacking in some way — and, in this recession (which may be "over" according to traditional economic yardsticks but nonetheless continues for millions), there is no doubt that many Americans, after comparing current conditions to just about any other period in their lives, will conclude that the quality of those lives has, at the very least, declined.

I don't know if issues of financial quality are at the heart of my nostalgia this holiday. Those are the kinds of things people can debate and, at some point, conclude that, were it not for certain facts, things in general would be better.

No, my nostalgia is more for the memories of the holidays and the people with whom I shared those holidays.

It would be nice to have those people with me today, but, realistically, I know that, human life spans being what they are, it was never possible that many of them would be alive in 2011.

I could argue — to a great extent, justifiably — that my life would be different if any of them were still alive. I don't know if my life would be better, but I am certain that the nature of my relationship(s) would be radically altered.

Many of the people I am missing on this Fourth of July would be at least 100 years old if they were alive today — and they would almost certainly be suffering from age–related health issues.

When you think of it that way, it's hard not to conclude they are better off. And so am I, to have been spared that. No one lives forever, and that, I tend to believe, is for the best. In my experience, every life, if permitted to continue long enough, will reach a point of diminishing return where attempts to further sustain it are futile.

I miss my mother and my grandparents and our friends, but I'm glad I have my memories of them as they were and the Independence Days we shared.

I grew up in the South, where it is always hot and humid in the summer. It was in part for that reason that my parents liked to take my brother and me on summer trips to visit friends in Vermont, where it was always cool and pleasant in the summer.

In fact, at times, as I recall, it could be downright cold. I remember some summer nights in Vermont when my parents' friends, who were the caretakers of a ski lodge, built a fire in the fireplace. There were some nights when I had to sleep with a blanket to keep me warm.

It did get warm, even hot at times — but not oppressively so — in the daytime. I have memories of swimming in lakes and streams in Vermont as a child — but I also remember wearing a jacket one Fourth of July evening when my family and our friends went to an old–fashioned village green to see a fireworks show.

I experienced my share of hot weather Independence Days when I was growing up, though. My mother's parents were members of a fishing club in east Texas, and we often met them there when school was out. The lodge was a big, old–fashioned country house with dozens of bedrooms, a huge dining room and a big screened–in porch with rocking chairs.

Members could stay overnight, and so could their guests. My grandfather kept a fishing boat on the premises, as did many other people, and I have quite a few memories of getting up early to go fishing with my grandfather and my father when I was a child.

I was never very good at fishing, but that didn't really matter to my grandfather. He just enjoyed getting out in the silence and serenity of the early morning on the lake, and my memory is that we spent more time on those excursions talking about things we observed than things we caught.

From time to time, my family joined my grandparents for the Fourth of July in east Texas, and I will always remember watching the fireworks show over that lake. Seeing the reflection in the water was almost like getting two shows for the price of one.

There were also times when we didn't go anywhere, just spent the Fourth of July in my childhood home in Arkansas. That wasn't a bad deal, either. We would grill hamburgers, and my mother would fix baked beans with brown sugar and diced green pepper. There would also be corn on the cob — and my brother and I would take turns handcranking the homemade ice cream for our dessert.

Unless we were having ice–cold watermelon instead.

We lived on a lake. There were no fireworks displays there when I was a child, but we lived outside the city limits so we could buy fireworks at the roadside stands that always seemed to spring up around mid–June and have our own shows.

We got bottle rockets and Roman candles — all the pyrotechnic stuff we needed to celebrate our nation's independence. I remember being amazed when I got up the next morning and saw the amount of debris that had been left by our celebration.

(As a child, I remember stocking up on Black Cat firecrackers — with the intention of using them to blow up things like ice when winter froze everything. The novelty of that experience wore off rather quickly.)

On one such occasion when my family stayed home for the Fourth, we did something we seldom did.

The day before the holiday, we went into town to get supplies — soft drinks, hamburger meat, watermelon, the usual stuff — and we stopped at a place called Dog n Suds for lunch.

Now, Dog n Suds was the kind of place that used to be fairly common in America — a drive–in much like today's Sonic with an actual dining room where you could go in, sit down and place an order.

Dog n Suds specialized in hot dogs and root beer (hence, the name), but my memory is that you could buy other soft drinks there, too, and you could get hamburgers, french fries or onion rings as well. There may have been some other things on the menu.

Most of the time, we went there on my birthday or my brother's birthday because Dog n Suds offered some kind of special meal deal for kids on their birthdays — a complimentary hot dog and root beer, perhaps.

For some reason, on that occasion we decided to stop at Dog n Suds for lunch. True, there weren't many options in my hometown in those days. We didn't even have a McDonald's in my hometown until I was old enough to drive.

But we didn't have to eat lunch while we were in town. We could have waited to eat until we got home, I suppose.

We didn't, though. We did something that we almost never did at that time in my life. And so that is why today, instead of thinking of fireworks shows and the like, I am thinking of hot dogs and root beer at Dog n Suds.

The food was good, not great, but being taken there for one's birthday was something of a status symbol. In grade school, I remember that the first question one was asked when everyone realized that someone had celebrated a birthday (even before being asked about birthday gifts) was "Did you go to Dog n Suds?"

Going there when it wasn't anyone's birthday was a rare treat.

For a long time, children in my hometown could still get that birthday special at Dog n Suds. When I was a teenager, I remember working nights at a self–service gas station across the street from that old Dog n Suds. It was still in operation. I watched the lights switch off promptly at 10 each night, and I observed that the flow of traffic there was not particularly heavy, but it never occurred to me that it might be struggling.

Apparently, it was struggling, though. I haven't been in my hometown in many years, and I have heard that it has grown to three times the size it was when I lived there, but the Dog n Suds didn't survive.

I don't remember when I heard that news, but I remember grieving when I heard it.

It is a disappearing chain of eateries now, relics from another time. Last I heard, there were only a handful of Dog n Suds outlets left in the U.S., even though I understand that, at one time, they were almost as common in the middle United States as McDonald's, Sonic or Burger King.

Like Dog n Suds, many things seem to be disappearing from the American experience. I heard recently that Yarnell's, a traditional ice cream company in Arkansas, is closing because of the economy. I can't tell you how many dishes of Yarnell's ice cream I ate as a child — at birthday parties, at summer gatherings, at home — or how sorry I am that future generations will be deprived of that pleasure.

Another pleasure that children in my hometown won't have that I did was eating a Minuteman hamburger.

Minuteman was a regional chain, located mostly in Arkansas and Tennessee, I believe. The advertising logo showed a minuteman, like the ones who defended the colonies during the American Revolution, standing with a musket in one hand. The advertising pitch was something like this — you would get your meal in a minute.

In hindsight, those burgers probably weren't anything terribly special. My memory is that they were advertised as "flame–broiled burgers", and I always ordered a hickory burger, which was served with a dollop of hickory barbecue sauce.

My hometown, as I say, has grown considerably since I was a child, but many of the things I remember — like Dog n Suds and Minuteman — are gone now.

And I grieve for those who will never know such childhood pleasures.