Sophie's Story

     One of my favourite TV shows is "A Football Life" which is broadcast on the NFL network. It is an hour long show that is a biography about a coach, player or some other person that was influential in the sport.  There was an episode on former quarterback Steve Young. I watched it with interest. The show was based on the new book that Young had written about his life called "QB: My Life Behind the Spiral". It was an interesting show, but it felt like an hour long commercial for the book. I didn't delete the episode from the DVR after I'd finished watching it though. Maybe I'd want to see it again.   It wasn't the first time I'd heard of the book. There were some excerpts from it published in the LDS Living magazine. I read them and found them interesting as well. I know that male members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have certain expectations. Young had not gone on a two year mission as young LDS men are strongly enco...

   In his book, 'This Just In', reporter Bob Schieffer writes about something that took place on Thanksgiving. He had recently been hired by CBS to anchor the Morning Show. This was a show that would be broadcast on weekday mornings and would originate from New York. This meant that he and his family would have to move from Washington DC to New York. He broke this news to his daughters over Thanksgiving dinner. I will quote in his own words the reaction of one of them.   "Susan let out a blood-curdling scream, jumped up from the table, ran into the front yard and began rolling around on the wet grass. 'Why would you tell us on Thanksgiving?' she shouted. 'This is nothing to be thankful for.'"   This is pretty much how I feel about this nearly past year.  I'm not minded to jump up from my computer desk and go outside to roll around on the grass. (It's 35 degrees outside and there is a little snow on the ground.) Her response of, "This...

  It started with a washcloth. A cute knitted cotton dishcloth that was given to me by a customer. I loved the hand knitted dishcloths that Mrs. Mac would sometimes bring the pharmacy staff. They were far better than the ones that you can buy in the store.   Mrs. Mac eventually became too ill to knit and a while later she passed away. No more dishcloths. I remember looking at the dishcloth and thinking that I could learn how to knit one. Then I would have an ample supply. Even better I could make dishcloths for others and show them how much better they are.   I didn't think I would ever be able to learn. I didn't know any body that knitted and I just didn't have time to go to a yarn shop and take classes. They probably would not be able to teach me anyway because I'm left handed. I didn't think anything of it.   I did mention my wish to learn how to knit to my friend Dana. At the time I didn't know what was going to happen. That harmless little dishcloth wa...

  Hi This is Scamp and Colby. Sophie has been working a lot lately so we decided that we'd better write the column for her.   We've been surfing the internet the last week or so. We know that Sophie doesn't like us to surf the internet unless she is there to supervise. We do it anyway because we'll never find out what's going on in the world if we don't.   Quite frankly, we are shocked at some of the things we are seeing. One of the things that we are seeing is humans being mean to each other. I mean really, really mean. I saw a picture of a message about black lives don't matter spray painted on a wall. We saw pictures of strange looking crosses that look like spiders spray painted on walls as well. I asked Sophie what those were and she told me they were called swastikas and that it was a symbol of Nazi Germany. The she explained to me what that meant. It made me sad. Colby read reports of people who were being harassed and threatened by other people...

   My friend, Dana,is in Hawaii. She and her sisters are visiting their brother who lives out there. I'm sure they are having a wonderful time seeing the sights. I think her brother might be a scuba diving instructor so they may be doing a little of that too.   I'm happy for her. She works hard and should enjoy a little R and R with her sisters.   Hawaii is lovely. It looks beautiful and warm. There are beaches and amazing flowers. There is fresh tropical fruit and exotic foods. There are volcanoes. The people are friendly. It has a rich history and a musical sounding native language. Who wouldn't want to hop the first plane out there? Especially in the winter and early spring.    Me, that's who.   For some reason I have no desire to visit our 50th state.   Why is that? There it nothing wrong with spending a little or a lot of time in a place like Hawaii.    I remember a Garrison Keillor monologue "News F...

   I am not a fan of the Minnesota Vikings.  Despite the fact that I live in Minnesota and have for many years I've never cheered for what would be the home team. Part of the reason for this is that my parents were both raised in Wisconsin by Green Bay Packer fans.    I will say that I do have respect for the team. They've had very good seasons. Up until the last few weeks they were an undefeated team despite the fact that they lost their quarterback and their best best running back. I do have a serious reason for disliking the Vikings. One reason is the new stadium. I had heard that Hennepin County gave the owner of the Vikings a lot of tax breaks and other incentives. This really bothered me. I know that one argument for the stadium is that it will create jobs. It would create some jobs, but those jobs would be low paying and seasonal. I also feel that the money the county was spending on the new stadium would be better  spent improving school in the...

   The last few months I've had some experiences with people that that have bothered me. I've been pondering these experiences wondering why I feel the way I do about them. Besides the fact that they happened within the past few months what do they have in common?   I finally came to the realization that one thing the incidents had in common is that both the people involved are people I know don't like me. What bothered me was that I felt they were being blatant about it.   It lead me to thinking that we sometimes don't know how to deal with those we dislike. Technology is allowing us to narrow our circles so many of us don't have to deal with people we dislike.   As children we are taught to be kind and accepting of others. We are taught to share and to get along. If you happen to be of a Christian faith you are also taught that everyone is your brother or sister and that you have to love them as such.   What do you do when you run into so...