Mom's Milestone

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Today would have been a milestone for my mother — if she had not died in a flash flood 16 years ago.

Today would have been her 80th birthday — and, if nature had not intervened, I am quite sure she would still be with us today.

I can't know a thing like that, of course. But I know the family history, and I know what Mom's health was like on the day she drowned. At the time she died, I believed she could have been with us for another 20 years, at least, and I still believe that today.

Anything else could have happened in the last 16 years, though. Family history isn't infallible. Mom's father died of a heart attack in his sleep when he was 70. The same thing could have happened to her.

But my grandmother outlived my grandfather by nearly 20 years — even though the quality of the last 10 years of her life is debatable. She suffered increasingly from dementia, and I know that Mom feared a similar fate.

She never said so, but she didn't have to.

Mom was a first–grade teacher. At times, it seemed to me that she drew energy from the 6– and 7–year–olds in her classroom. They kept her young, and I realized, after she died, that a significant part of her was afraid of ending up like my grandmother, unable to recognize those who came to see her, unable even to communicate in her final years.

Funny thing — when Mom died, she was the subject of several newspaper articles because she had been recognized for her classroom innovations. Someone (and I can't remember now whether it was an administrator or another teacher or a parent who said this) was quoted as saying Mom was "everyone's favorite grandmother."

I had trouble seeing her as a grandmother. Mom was a free and independent spirit. She also had a childlike fascination with things that I'm sure made her popular with the children who spent their first year in elementary school in her classroom. It permeated her life — and I never realized that until after she died.

I remember one day when I was sorting through my mother's belongings following her death. My father walked into the room while I was looking at a special vest Mom wore on an excursion to St. Louis with some of her colleagues. The vest was covered in buttons she got at a Cardinals baseball game.

One button was equipped with a music player. When you pressed it, it played "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." I pressed it, listened to it, looked up and saw my father, who had entered the room without my notice. He smiled. "Your mother was a child," he said, turned and walked out of the room.

Yes, she was. Maybe that was what made her such a great mother — and a great teacher (and, by extension, everyone's favorite grandmother). Above all other things, my memory is that it was fun having her for my mom. She made everything an adventure. I'm sure it was that way for the children in her classroom.

I am about to begin my second year of adjunct teaching in the local community college, and I am trying to apply things she taught me in my classroom. It is a work in progress.

After she died, a family friend sought to comfort my brother and me by observing that Mom "went out at the top of her game."

At that time and under those circumstances, it simply wasn't possible for me to be comforted by that thought — I didn't want her to be gone, still don't, and no thoughts that indicated an acceptance of the new reality could be tolerated — but I have drawn some comfort from it since.

I wish Mom was still with us, but if she was spared her mother's fate, then I am thankful for that.

You see, I understand now, in a way that I really didn't before, that no one lives forever. Oh, I said things like that, but it was more of an expression for me, I guess. I didn't really think about the truth of those words or however subtly they might be influencing me (sort of like the Pledge of Allegiance I dutifully recited each morning as a child). I do now.

I understand that, while no one really wants to die (probably because none of us can be absolutely sure what happens when we die — we may think that we know, but no one who is living can really know), it's going to happen to all of us. I can't imagine what that will be like, but I've concluded that there would be no advantage in living forever — not even if one could strike some sort of deal and be sure never to age or lose one's mobility.

Since such a Faustian arrangement is not possible — at least as far as I know — I would rather not linger past the time that all my contemporaries have gone. I would rather be taken when I am still alert and capable — and the people I leave behind believe there were still things I didn't do that I should have done before I died — than to overstay my welcome and die long after my quality of life began to decline.

Whichever it turns out to be, I would just prefer that my death wouldn't be an excessively painful or lingering one. I don't even have to know it's happening. My grandfather died in his sleep — wouldn't any of us choose that over being conscious?

Mom's quality of life definitely did not decline — and I can only hope that she did not experience too much pain. But that is something I will never know.

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Lately, I've been thinking a lot about Mom's sense of humor. It was different, but I really miss it.

Mom had a great knack for laughing at herself.

When I was a child, she used to make a beef–noodle casserole that was absolutely delicious. As far as I could see, it was perfect. Mom used to rave about how easy it was to prepare, and I don't exaggerate when I say it was one of my favorite dishes. I actually looked forward to evening meals when I knew it was on the menu.

She served it once when some friends came over, and they went wild, insisting that Mom give them the recipe. She promised that she would.

Never one to put off such things, Mom typed the recipe on an index card the very next day and passed it along to her friend while she was out running errands.

(Now, when I say "typed," I mean that — literally. It was long before personal computers and word processors with spell checkers or any of that other stuff. Mom used a typewriter — and it was the old–fashioned, manual kind, too.)

Mom didn't proofread the card first, and it turned out she had typed an o instead of an e in the word "noodle" in the title of the recipe (which was something very basic, like "Beef–Noodle Casserole," but, with the typo, it read "Beef–Noodlo Casserole").

Someone noticed the typo and remarked that the dish was "Goodloe's Noodle–ohs." Mom liked that. We ate it at least once a week every week — and we called it "Goodloe's Noodle–ohs" for about as long as I can remember.

It became kind of a family joke. I can remember having friends over to spend the night, and I would ask Mom what we were having for dinner. She would reply "Goodloe's Noodle–ohs," seemingly oblivious to the fact there was a guest in the house who wasn't familiar with the joke.

Mom also liked to joke about what she called the "Goodloe luck." It was sort of a family variation on Murphy's law. I'm not sure if she originated it or not — or if perhaps my father played a role — but if something went wrong, we were sure to hear the "Goodloe luck" mentioned.

The photo of Mom sitting in our foldout camper was taken on the occasion of my favorite example of the "Goodloe luck." We had driven from Dallas to South Padre Island during the Christmas holidays — about an 11– or 12–hour drive, as I recall. It was something we had done — without incident — the year before, and the entire family was looking forward to some sand, surf and fresh seafood.

The picture that shows Mom smiling and laughing in our camper was taken about an hour after our arrival. The weather was gorgeous, and everyone was in a jovial mood. But, during the night, a storm front moved in, and we spent the next couple of days huddled around that small table, eating modest meals and playing card games while wind and rain pounded the tiny trailer outside.

Finally, my parents decided that we had had enough, and we left on the third day. We took down our camper in a pouring rain and began the long drive back to my grandmother's home in Dallas. On the way, we heard on the radio that the storm was the worst to strike the area in decades. Boats were missing at sea.

That, my parents agreed, was the "Goodloe luck."

I guess the most extreme example of the "Goodloe luck" was the flash flood that took Mom's life. But that would be a real misnomer. There was nothing lucky about that night.

Well, anyway, today would have been her birthday. It isn't the anniversary of her death. It's an appropriate time to remember who she was, not how she died.

I can't help feeling somewhat wistful on this day. I think of the world that existed on the day Mom died and the world that exists today, and I can't help wishing she had lived to see some of the things I have seen.

The flip side of that, of course, is that I'm glad she was spared some of the things that have happened since her death — so I suppose it is something of a tradeoff, as it is in every life, be it wealthy or privileged or longer than most.

In the great scheme of things, I guess one life is pretty much the same as the next. Some are longer than others. Some are more accomplished.

Religious people often speak of "God's will" and his "plan." I guess it is the only way some people can make sense of the irrational. There must be a reason why terrible things happen. We just aren't smart enough to figure it out.

I guess it's comforting, in a way, to believe that things that appear to make no sense — like the deaths of children — really do have a purpose. And some people believe the purposes for all things will be revealed to us when we die.

But some people will tell you that, whatever the reasons for these things may be, those reasons are God's, not man's — and God is under no obligation to explain himself.

So life continues to be, as it has always been, unfair. Some lives end far too early while others go on for a century or more, and there is no justification for it. Some lives are harder than most while others are easier, and there is no obvious justification for that, either.

I don't think I ever discussed this with Mom during her life. I know she believed in God, but I don't know what her conclusions were about the inequities of life.

Mom's life could have been longer than it was. Perhaps it could have been more accomplished.

But today, I want to remember Mom's life, and I want to do something to mark the occasion. Today is Saturday, and I'm going to the cemetery.

Maybe it seems odd to say that, but it isn't. Not really. In the years since Mom's death, the cemetery is the only place where I can feel close to her. I don't know if it is her "spirit" or not. I just know that is the way it is.

I used to go there every year on the anniversary of her death. I preferred going to the cemetery in May over going there in August, even though going there in May always seemed like more of an observance of her death than her life. It's always hot here in August — and it has been especially hot this summer.

But, since this would have been a milestone birthday for Mom, I will brave the elements, however severe they may be, and pay a visit in the morning hours. I'll keep it short, though. Classes at the community college begin next week, and I have last–minute preparations to make.

Mom would have understood.

Foresight in Hindsight

I taught journalism on the college level for awhile in the 1990s, then I was sidetracked by other things.

(I liked the way Robert Redford used that word to describe, in "The Natural," why he had been away from pro ball for so long. I think it frequently applies to life in general.)

Nearly a year ago, I returned to the classroom. I've been teaching journalism again, and I've also been teaching developmental writing, which focuses on the fundamentals of written English (subjects, verbs, prepositional phrases, dependent and independent clauses, etc.), at the local community college.

As the start of my second year there approaches, I've been thinking about what I learned last year and how I can improve what I've been doing.

That isn't quite as easy as it may sound because there are many differences between being a professor at a four–year college and being an adjunct professor at a community college. I can't always apply what I learned in the classroom then to what I'm doing now.

Last year, I spent the summer preparing to teach classes that wound up being canceled just before the school year began because enrollment in those classes wasn't sufficient.

It wasn't that way when I was teaching in the 1990s. In those days, I knew what I would be teaching long before the semester began. My classes were never canceled because enrollment didn't reach a certain level.

Anyway, I hope I'll be teaching journalism again this fall. It remains to be seen if I will.

I do know, though, that I will be teaching developmental writing again — because it is required unless incoming students meet or exceed a certain grade on their placement tests — and I've been thinking about what I learned from teaching that class last year.

I think one of the most important things I have learned has to do with expectations.

Some of my students are foreign students for whom English is a second language, and they compare the rules of their native language to the rules of their acquired one. That is their frame of reference. It is how we human beings process information. We compare new knowledge to that which we already have.

For others, I think it's a simple matter of applying logic — if something is true in one usage, it must be true in all usages. Same sort of thing, really. It's all based on past experience — and the knowledge of previous outcomes.

I was thinking about this the other day, and I was reminded of an old episode of I Love Lucy in which Lucy, who was expecting the couple's baby, decided that everyone who came in regular contact with her child — Ricky, Fred and Ethel — had to speak nothing but perfect English.

Ricky, whose native tongue was Spanish, resisted, but Lucy made her point by asking him to read out loud a story that worked in several words that had similar spellings but different pronunciations — all in just a few sentences.

The spelling was o–u–g–h. It was pronounced differently, of course, depending upon which letter(s) came before.

Anyway, the story Ricky read was about a woodsman. It spoke of how he cut boughs (pronounced bows) from trees.

All this cutting made his hands quite rough (pronounced ruff). Also, apparently, all this cutting released a lot of junk into the air, which gave the woodsman a hacking cough (koff).

There were other sentences that contained words like enough (enuff) and through (threw). I'm sure you get the idea.

Ricky mispronounced each word and got increasingly frustrated. Spanish isn't so complicated, he protested. A sound is always the same. It sounds the same. It is spelled the same.

Many of my students last year (and, I am sure, many of my students in the coming year) would sympathize with Ricky. Why must written English be so complicated?

Well, the main reason is that the British Isles were occupied by different conquerors over the centuries, and elements of those languages were absorbed into the evolving English language. In English, you will find words with roots from all corners of the globe — primarily from the civilizations that actively occupied Britain at different times but also from cultures that were more like bystanders.

Each contributed words (and whatever linguistic peculiarities came along with them) to the language.

As a result, you have to work a little harder to make sure that you do things correctly in English. One must apply, as fictional detective Hercule Poirot put, the little grey cells. One size does not always fit all.

I tried to make this point with my students last semester by contrasting written English with other subjects — and I unexpectedly learned a couple of things about the shortcomings of the modern educational system.

In math, I told my students, when you learn the multiplication tables, you know that they will never vary. The answers will always be the same. Two times three will always equal six. Three times three will never equal six.

You can count on it.

In chemistry, I told them, H₂O is always the chemical formula for water. It is never the chemical formula for anything else.

You can count on it.

Those examples made my point, but I wanted to add one more for emphasis. In hindsight, I should have stopped when I was ahead — and launched into my discussion of the peculiarities of the English language.

In history, I told my students, events always happened whenever they happened. When you commit an important date to memory, it doesn't change. The years in which the American Civil War was fought will always be between 1861 and 1865. The year of President Kennedy's assassination will always be 1963.

To drive home my point, I said to my students, "If someone says '1776' to you, what do you think of?"

I was shocked that no one, in a classroom full of people, raised a hand to indicate that he/she knew the answer. I thought everyone knew the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776.

I still think it is a good point — even if the modern education system doesn't seem to be producing high school graduates with adequate appreciation for their history. I mean, even if those students don't know those dates, they are facts that you will find in any history book.

English is much more ambiguous. It isn't as certain as a mathematical equation or a chemical formula or a date in a history book.

But that is what makes English, both spoken and written, a living, vibrant thing.

My students want written language to be a simple, fill–in–the–blank proposition, like the mathematical formulae they learned when they were younger. Logically, they know that only three times two will equal six so if they are asked to complete something like this — 3 X ___ = 6 — they know that 2 is the only possible answer.

But the rules are different for language. My students seem to have trouble understanding that the very same word may be a noun in some uses — and a verb in others.

For example, take the word run. Ordinarily, that is a verb — They run in the park.

But it can also be a noun — for example, when it is used as part of the names of events or when it is used to describe the act of scoring (particularly in baseball). Under such circumstances, it becomes a noun.

The same thing applies to spelling, punctuation, all that stuff. You've gotta use your brain.

If I can get my students to use their brains, I feel we're moving in the right direction — even if there is still much to be done on the basics.

That's the way I feel about the people who are in charge of the debt ceiling negotiations in Washington these days.

Creative solutions are required. Everyone — the president, the speaker of the House, everyone in Congress — needs to put the interests of the nation ahead of everything else.

I'd like to get all of them to look beyond their limited horizons.

They might not be able to resolve the situation once and for all — but, at least, they could deal with this crisis and move beyond the roadblocks.

Our problems, as John F. Kennedy said, are man made. Therefore, they can be solved by men.

Thanksgiving Travel

I've been teaching a news writing class at the community college here in Dallas this fall.

It's been an interesting and challenging semester for me. I've been away from the classroom for several years, and I've been away from the newsroom for several years as well, and a lot of things have changed.

It is not my intention to recite all those differences here in some kind of "those were the days" rant. I expected things to be different. That's the nature of things. Nothing remains static.

Certainly, the relative health of the newspaper business hasn't remained static. As the economy has worsened, many newspaper subscribers have stopped subscribing in an effort to save a little money. That means that circulation numbers have dropped at most newspapers. And, as circulation has dropped, advertisers have been more reluctant to invest money in advertising that (presumably) fewer people will see.

Newspapers, in turn, are forced to take certain steps to save money because, as I have said here before, advertising revenue is the life blood of a newspaper.

It's a vicious circle.

I guess it always has been volatile, always vulnerable to economic downturns and technological shifts. Computers and the internet play roles today that my colleagues and I never could have imagined when I was on the copy desk or the last time I was in the classroom.

To say the least, it has been an educational autumn for me. But it has also reinforced my belief in certain things, one of which is that, no matter what kind of news delivery system comes along in the future, people will be needed who can exercise news judgment and apply it to that news delivery system in some way.

Not everyone can resolve technical issues. Many of the journalists I have known in my life probably couldn't balance their checkbooks, much less fix software problems. But most journalists can write, and if they know basic HTML or SEO stuff, they can apply it to their work and help prepare it for use on the internet as well as the publication for which they work.

Admittedly, HTML and SEO are mostly technical. But the skills I learned in college, polished in my work for newspapers and now hope to pass on to my students can, with modification, be put to practical use outside of newspapers. And such modification these days tends to involve adjustments that

I tell my students that the way to enhance their value as modern journalists is to be community–oriented. They should focus, I tell them, on giving their readers what they cannot get anywhere else

In hindsight, I guess, I have always felt that way, but the internet has made that even more relevant to the survival of journalism. And, in spite of its current problems, I do believe journalism will survive as long as it focuses primarily on the needs of its local readers.

I am guided in this by the knowledge that the New York Times is planning to start charging for access to its website. The Times tried this a few years ago, and it didn't work so it made its content available at no charge again. The poor economy apparently has prompted the Times to revisit that policy.

As tempted as I am to remind you of what Albert Einstein said about the definition of insanity, I will resist.

Instead, I simply want to point out that the Times' experience confirms what I believe — that newspapers (print publications of all kinds, really) were far too slow to recognize the role that computers and the internet would play in the dissemination of news.

By the time the owners of traditional newspapers realized that the internet was the wave of the future and, more importantly, there was money to be made in it, the public had grown accustomed to the idea that there were many free news sources out there.

Consumers like myself, who read the Times online, are not likely to pay for access to its content unless they live in New York and are looking for information they can't get anywhere else.

I do not live in New York, and I can find articles on just about any national or international news event on many other sites — so, when the Times starts charging for its content, I will simply stop visiting the site (unless I hear that, once again, it is making its content freely accessible).

Anyway, back to my news writing class ...

Earlier this semester, I concocted some scenarios and acted like a public information officer. In these scenarios, the students took on the roles of reporters and had to ask me questions to get important details. Then they had to write their stories based on the information they had gathered.

As the semester progressed, I wanted to combine some of the more routine tasks I often had to perform when I worked for daily newspapers with the internet environment and the work of internet research in our in–class simulations — so a few weeks ago, I cast my students in the roles of writers for a locally based internet site that emphasizes local news.

I asked them to use the internet to gather information for their articles and provide a list of their sources so I could check on them. Their first such assignment was an article that would be "posted" all week, reminding visitors to the site to adjust their clocks when daylight saving time ended the following weekend.

A couple of weeks later, I asked them to write a similar story reminding readers that the annual Great American Smokeout was coming up.

I'm a "recovering smoker," I told my students, and there were many times when I heard the Smokeout was coming up and I made a mental note that I wanted to take part in it, but, when the time came, I was busy with my life and I forgot about it — so I went ahead with my daily routine, smoking while I got ready for work, smoking while I drove to work, smoking on my breaks — and I might not have heard that it was the Smokeout until the day was half over.

By then, it was too late for anything except maybe a symbolic gesture.

People need to be reminded of these things, I told my students, and smokers need to know if there will be any efforts locally to provide them with support while they try to go 24 hours without lighting up.

I reminded them that it isn't a matter of "willpower." It goes much deeper than that. Nicotine, we have long been told, is a tougher addiction to beat than heroin.

I was pleased that they found some noteworthy support services that were being offered locally but hadn't really gotten any publicity. I regretted that what my students had written had no website on which to be posted.

Then, this week, I decided to combine something that was coming up with something that has been in the news recently — the traditionally heavy travel that usually occurs on the day before Thanksgiving and the reports of overly intimate "patdowns" conducted by security personnel at airports and intimate X–ray images that were supposed to be destroyed when no longer needed but instead have ended up on the internet.

I told my students to write about anything that might influence a local reader's decision about any aspect of travel. DFW International Airport is one of the busiest airports in the country, but none of my students uncovered any recommendations from DFW's administrators that suggested that things might be easier for travelers if they came at particular times or took any other precautions.

At the time, I really thought there might be more problems than apparently there have been today.

Some things may yet surface, but right now — at least according to the Associated Press — things have been pretty smooth at the nation's airports.

Oh, there were some rumblings about a movement among disgruntled travelers to "opt out" of invasive procedures. And, apparently, there were some people who took that approach. But they didn't make a big show of it at the airports.

Most appeared to follow the recommendations of protest organizers and simply stayed home.

Indeed, inclement weather seems to be the most urgent concern for travelers right now.

If that's the worst thing that happens to the TSA this Thanksgiving, that should be something to be thankful for.