Category Archives: opinion

Posted in opinion

DEAR INSTACART…

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Dear Instacart,

I thought this day would never come and I can’t believe I’m writing this, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to break up with you.  We’ve been through a lot together over the past few years.  You have tolerated the last minute changes to my shopping list and I have put up with your delivery fees, ridiculous upcharges and tipping requirements even for poor service.  Oh, we had some good times and I will always be grateful that we didn’t have to haul those 40 pound bags of potassium home from Costco, but no amount of heavy lifting can compensate for the seemingly brain-addled “customer service” delivery people you have in your employ.

I realize that COVID has caused all of us to make some changes to our lifestyle.  For those of us drawing Social Security that has meant staying home a bit more and relying on delivery services such as yours.  I do realize that has required you to hire a lot of people quickly to meet the demand.  But might I suggest that in addition to a drug test you also hold a mirror under the nose of any prospective employee just to make sure they’re functioning?  Or perhaps hold a flashlight up to their ear to see if a beam of light shines through to the other side, to determine if there is actually something in between.  Let me detail my last two experiences with your company.

In May I placed a  very large order – we were at the beginning of “hunkering down” and I wanted to ensure we had adequate supplies.  When the driver arrived my husband and I took turns wiping down the groceries before bringing them into the house (remember those fun days?). As the driver was backing out of our driveway I noticed that quite a few items were missing. I ran out into the street and flagged him down to tell him of the problem. It was then that he remembered that he had another large box of items for us in his trunk. TRUNK??? What happened to your promise of “your items will be kept in a temperature controlled environment” during delivery? In May, in Arizona, the only temperature in the trunk of a car is HOT. I wrote it off as a one time problem. But, alas, I was being way too optimistic.

Two weeks ago we needed more potassium so I ordered three bags plus seven other items. My shopper notified me that she started my order at 11:15.  Because I don’t have much to do these days I obsessively kept looking at my phone for updates as she shopped.  A person with blindfolds on could have shopped faster.  At first I thought maybe she was grazing the “tasting stations” but then remembered they are shut down. It got to be 11:45 and she had three items in the cart. I was screaming at the phone. That didn’t help. She didn’t conclude shopping until 12:10. I could have driven there, shopped and been home in that amount of time. I assumed (correctly, as it turns out) this person had trouble finding things so I called our guard gate and asked them to provide your driver with a very detailed map to our house.  Hansel and Gretl could not have done a better job at highlighting the trail.

It is normally a 20 minute drive to Costco but your driver must have detoured to … well, I don’t know quite where.  She didn’t arrive at the gate until 1 pm. It should take six minutes to get to our house from there. At 1:15 I assumed (again, correctly) that your driver was lost. I got into my car and drove around trying to spot her. No luck. Finally at 1:25 she called to tell me since we weren’t home she was leaving our groceries in our driveway. We were IN our driveway. She asked me to confirm the address – which was on both our Instacart account and the map she was given – and sure enough, she had the wrong house number. Finally, she arrived at our home, unloaded the potassium and a small box of other items and then said, “Oh yeah, I have your case of water in the back of my truck”. I assumed she meant the back seat of the cabin but no, it was actually in the flatbed of her truck, roasting in the 106 degree temperature for the past hour and fifteen minutes. The water was so hot I could have brewed tea. We refused the case, explaining that it’s not healthy to drink out of hot plastic bottles.  She stared at me blankly.  I was speaking Greek as far as she was concerned.  To her credit, she refunded our money and took the case with her, no doubt to foist it on another unsuspecting customer.

So, dear Instacart, I hope you understand that unless and until you can hire people who have some modicum of common sense, we’re finished.  Might I suggest that you start with simple map reading.  I am not holding my breath.

Signed,

Just Another Satisfied Customer

 

Posted in Covid-19 • opinion

On the Path to Social Dysfunction

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by Bob Sparrow

(Because I usually write about where I’ve been or where I’m going, I don’t often sit around pondering my navel, but Covid-19 has changed all that.  In fact, it’s got me thinking about today’s two most-used words, ‘Social Distancing’.  Here’s what I pondered).

“We’re all in this together.” How many times have you heard that?  It’s an oxymoron, spoken mostly by morons.  We are social beings and nothing could be further from the truth than us ‘being in this together’.  We have been ordered to stay apart, with serious repercussions if we don’t!  You could wind up in jail if you disobey – solitary confinement probably!

But the reality is, we’ve experienced social distancing for some time – perhaps since the middle of the last century.  Yes, we, as a species, have been ‘distancing’ ourselves from each other for at least the past 50-60 years – so we should be pretty good at it by now.  Don’t believe me?  Let these ‘Then and Now’ photos tell the story, a story that many of you, who have passed the mid-life crisis phase of your life, have witnessed firsthand.

Remember when you stood around and talked to your friends?  Today’s kids have been physically close, but socially distant.

 

Remember when the neighborhood would get together to play a game?  Now a kid can play a game with another kid half way around the world from his bedroom

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember when office meetings were a time when the whole staff came together?  Now you can attend the meeting ‘digitally’ in your underwear.  I’m sure you’ve heard that this, like so many other ‘socially distant’ activities, is the ‘new normal’!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember when the family used to go to a game?  Now there is a cardboard cutout in your place and you will root through your phone.

 

Remember when you used to dine out?  Now your meals are delivered to your home.

 

 

Remember the hug?  It’s now been replaced with the elbow bump.  So personal!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I know what you’re saying – this has all be brought on by Covid-19.  Yes, Covid-19 has exacerbated this issue, but social distancing has been going on for way too long and unless we stop its momentum we’re going to find ourselves as protagonists in an isolated dystopian world, probably in a bubble.    Experts say that Social Distancing leads to loneliness, depression, post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance use disorder, domestic violence, child abuse, increase in suicide and a broad range of other mental and behavioral disorders.  In other words, Social Distancing is NOT GOOD FOR US!

I’m not advocating ignoring the health warnings that have been issued, as random and illogical as some may seem, I’m just saying, for our own health and welfare, when this is all over we need to get back to ‘socially magnetizing’.

 

Posted in opinion

HOW’S YOUR YEAR SO FAR?

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson
Once in a while that great wasteland of Facebook has a pretty spot on post.  I have always “written from scratch” but this was too good to pass up so I’m sharing it today.  Unfortunately I don’t know the author but it’s obviously someone with a pretty good sense of humor!
Dear Diary 2020 Edition,
In ❄️ January, 🔥 Australia caught on fire. I don’t even know if that fire was put out, because we straight up almost went to war with Iran 🇮🇷 . We might actually still be almost at war with them 🤔. I don’t know, because 👩 Jen Aniston and 👨🏻 Brad Pitt spoke to one another at an awards 🏆 show and everyone flipped the crap out 😲, but then there was this thing happening in 🦇 🇨🇳 China, then 👑 Prince Harry and Megan ✌🏼 peaced out of the Royal family, and there was the whole impeachment trial 👩‍⚖️, and then corona virus 🦠 showed up in the US ✔️“officially,” but then 🏀 Kobe died 😭and UK 🇬🇧 peaced out of the European Union.
In February, 🌽 Iowa crapped 💩 itself with the caucus results and the president was acquitted and the 👩🏼‍💼Speaker of the House took Ten. Whole. Years. to rip up a speech , but then The👨‍🔬 🌎WHO decided to give this virus a name COVID-19, which confused 🤔some really important people 👔 in charge of, like, our lives, into thinking there were 18 other versions before it, but then Harvey Weinstein was found guilty👨🏻‍⚖️, and 🇺🇸 Americans started asking if Corona beer 🍺 was safe to drink🤦🏻‍♀️, and everyone on Facebook became a doctor 👨‍⚕️ who just knew the 🤒flu killed way more people than COVID 1 through 18.
In March, stuff hit the fan👿. Warren dropped out of the presidential race and Sanders was like Bernie or bust 💥, but then Italy 🇮🇹 shut its whole country down 🚷, and then COVID Not 1 through 18 officially became what everyone already realized –  😱a pandemic – and then a nationwide state of emergency 🆘was declared in US 🇺🇸 , but it didn’t really change anything, so everyone was confused or thought it was still just a flu 💁🏻‍♀️, but then COVID Not 18 was like ya’ll not taking me seriously? 💡 I’m gonna infect the one celebrity everyone loves and totally infected Tom Hanks👨🏻, get y’all to close all of the schools so y’all can 🙏🏼 appreciate teachers 👩‍🏫 for once (because you can’t teach them anything other than how to use a touch screen🤦🏻‍♀️ ) close down all of salons so you can’t get your 💇‍♂️ hair or your nails done💅 , everyone had to work from home and attend Zoom meetings in their underwear. The 📉 DOW took a crap 💩 on itself, and most of us still don’t understand why the stock market is so important or even a thing 🤔 (I still don’t), We were then all introduced to 🐅 Tiger King and the ONE thing we can all agree on this year , 👍🏼Carol totally killed her husband⚰️ ….. whacked him! And then Netflix was like you’re welcome, and we all realized there was no way we were washing our hands enough in the first place because all of our hands are now dry and gross and we’re all searching for lotion.
In 🌧 April, Bernie finally busted✌🏼 himself out of the presidential race 🏃 , but then NYC 🗽became the set of The Walking Dead 💀 and we learned that no one has face masks 😷, ventilators, or toilet paper, or THE FREAKING SWIFFER WET JET LIQUID , and by now our 🦁outgrowth is showing, so there’s a shortage on 📦 box hair dye and all of our hair dressers are like , 😱 NO DONT DO IT!!! But, then Kim Jong-Un died, but then he came back to life … or did he? Who knows, because then the Pentagon released 🎥 videos of UFOs and nobody cared, and we were like man, it’s only April….
In 💐 May, the biblical end times kicked off , historical locust swarms, we learned of murder hornets 🐝 and realized that 2020 was the start of the Hunger Games🙈 however people forgot to let us know. People legit started to protest lockdown measures with 🔫 AR-15s, 🏀⚾️sports events were cancelled everywhere. But then people all over America finally reached a breaking point with race issues and violence. There were 🗣protests in every city🌃 ,which was confusing to some of us because people were definitely gathering in 👫crowds of more than 🖐🏼🤚🏼10 and for sure closer than 6 feet away ⬅️➡️from each other. Those people must have forgotten about the 😖pandemic called COVID Not One Through 18. Media 📺 🗞 struggled with how to 🤬focus on two important things at once, people in general struggle to focus on more than one important thing. A dead whale 🐋 was found in the middle of the Amazon rain forest 🌳 after monkeys 🐒 stole COVID 1 Through 19 from a lab 🔬 and ran off with them, and either in May or April (no one is keeping track of time now) that a giant asteroid ☄️ narrowly missed the Earth🌍.
In ☀️ June, common sense just got thrown 🤾🏼 straight out the window and somehow 😷 wearing masks became a 🏛political thing, but then everyone sort of remembered there was a pandemic,  then 👨‍🔬scientists announced they found a mysterious undiscovered mass at the center of the earth, and everyone was like 🙅🏽‍♂️🙅🏻‍♀️🚧DON’T YOU DARE TOUCH IT, but then everyone took a pause to realize that people actually believed Gone With The Wind 💨 was non-fiction, but then it was also announced that there is a strange 🛰radio signal coming from somewhere in the universe 🌌 that repeats itself every so many days 🗓 , and everyone was like 👽 DON’T YOU DARE ATTEMPT TO COMMUNICATE WITH IT‼️🚫 but then America reopened 🙌🏼from the shut down that actually wasn’t even a shut down, and so far, things have gone spectacularly … not that great 👎🏼. All of the Karen’s came out at once, and people started tearing down 🔨 statues. Everyone is on Facebook arguing 🤼‍♀️ about masks 👃🏼, but then Florida 🏖 was like hold my beer 🍺 and let me show you how we’re number one 🥇 in all things, including new Not Corona Beer Coronavirus. Then we learned there was a massive dust cloud ☁️ coming straight at us 📍from the Sahara Desert 🐫 , which is totally normal, but this is 2020, so the 👻 ghost mummy thing is most likely in that dust cloud. We then 📚 learned of meth-gators 🐊 , and I’m like that is so not on my flipping 2020 Bingo card 😡 can we use it as the free space?? 🤷🏻 Then we learned that the Congo’s worst ever Ebola 🚨 outbreak is over 😓, and we were all like, there was an Ebola outbreak that was the worse ever? 👀 … and don’t forget we just discovered FLYING SNAKES! 🐍, seriously! FLYING SNAKES!!!!
So here comes July…. at this point we are over it , just tell us what’s next … 👽 Aliens? 🔱Zeus? ☄️ Asteroids? Artificial Intelligence becomes self aware? Can it just be something cool 😎 or fun for once? Maybe even a good laugh , like hahaha 😂 April Fools! We all actually wouldn’t mind that joke at this point.
Also, why didn’t I know about the whale in the Amazon? Or a few other things because I just can’t keep up anymore!
BTW, a squirrel with Bubonic plague was found in CO… because, you know, it’s 2020.
Posted in opinion

MAKING MEMORIES

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

         Fireworks at Tahoe City

Last week I received two phone calls that saddened me.  Not in any big way – no deaths or illnesses, just to put it in perspective, but sad nonetheless.  The first was from a friend visiting grandchildren.  He lamented that the kids were bored and depressed.  Due to the COVID risk in their area they must stay at home, are not allowed to see their friends and if they do venture out with their parents they must wear a mask.  He asked me: “What kind of a childhood is this?”.  The next day I spoke with a friend who has a home in Lake Tahoe and she told me that the annual 4th of July fireworks display had been cancelled because they did not want large crowds gathering in town.  These two calls got me thinking about what it must be like to be a young child during this time, and what the long term repercussions might be.  As I think back to my childhood, the 4th of July fireworks at Tahoe were so special that the memory of them still brings a smile to my face.

                Meeks Bay in the 1950’s

We spent many weekends during the summer at our place at Tahoe.  We would often visit Meeks Bay Resort, a throwback destination that consisted of a wonderful, white sandy beach, an old hotel, an arcade room, snack bar and kayak rentals.  The highlight for me was when my dad gave me a nickel to buy popcorn out of the machine on the pier.  The bag invariably was filled to the brim and I spilled a good portion of it wending my way back to our spot on the beach.  Still…I can remember the smell and the sand in my feet to this day.  As I grew older I attended dances at the outdoor pavilion and spent hours on the beach, smothered in baby oil to get a  perfect tan.   More often that not I was burned to a crisp, a situation that I would recall some 50 years later when I was diagnosed with melanoma.  But when you’re young ignorance is bliss.

    Me…enjoying Rocky Beach

Most of the time our family went to a local beach on the west shore that was not sandy at all.  In fact, we called it Rocky Beach for obvious reasons.  The good part was that it was never crowded.  But it was never crowded for a reason:  you had to sit on lumpy rocks and there was no bathroom.   I hate to think of all the pee that went into that pristine lake.  And, oh yeah, the water was freezing cold, as it tends to be at Tahoe in early July.  It was so cold that if our parents and friends overindulged the night before it required a “quick dip” in the water at Rocky Beach to bring them back to their senses.  The photo of me at Rocky Beach shows just how much “fun” it was to wade into the freezing water.

       Pop – the “muscle man”

But the highlight of every summer was the 4th of July fireworks at Commons Beach in Tahoe City.  The fireworks show has been put on by the fire department every year since the 1930’s.  There is nothing quite like seeing the bursting display over the lake, as it produced a mirror image on the water’s reflection.  Truly, it was breathtaking.  And the advantage of being a kid is that we weren’t the least bit bothered by the loud bangs and soaring rockets that went on for an hour.  The first fireworks show I remember was in the mid-50’s and we continued that great tradition until 1972 when the cabin was sold.  This photo of our dad, joking around about his “magnificent” physique, was taken in 1971 over 4th of July weekend.   To this day, Tahoe fireworks are among my best memories.

Even Dash knows to mask up!

Which gets me back to the kids of today.  Sure, COVID will end at some point.  We will get a vaccine and hopefully we can move on.  But who knows when?  In the mean time, our young kids are missing school, missing friends and missing out on a summer of making memories that will last a lifetime. This year they missed the 4th of July fireworks all over the country.   And the thought of that makes me very sad.   Hopefully we can lick this thing quickly so the kids can have some fun and enjoy their carefree days of childhood.  After all, we know that soon enough life has a way of getting harder and they will need some wonderful memories to bolster their resilience.    Be safe and, like Dash the Wonder Dog, wear a mask!

 

Posted in opinion

THE BLONDE BODY AT BARTLETT LAKE

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Bartlett Lake

Beautiful Bartlett Lake

Here in the COVID capital of the nation we are hard pressed for something to do.   So last week we packed Dash the Wonder Dog in the car and drove the 30 miles up to Bartlett Lake, a picturesque body of water known for it’s massive display of wildflowers.  Of course, that only happens in March so by June we were left with the stubby remnants.  Still, it beat walking from the living room to the bedroom as an activity.  As we drove into the marina I recalled the death of Margaret Lesher at this spot back in 1997.  I hadn’t thought about her in years, but as I did so, I still marveled at her life.  It was a cross between a Danielle Steel romance and a John Grisham murder mystery.

Margaret

Margaret and Dean Lesher

I first saw Margaret Lesher back in 1995.  I knew who she was, of course, because she had been married to Dean Lesher, publisher of 27 newspapers in California, most notably the Contra Costa Times.  They were prominent members of the community, forming a charitable foundation and sponsoring the performing arts center in Walnut Creek.  In 1993 Dean died at the age of 90.  They had been married for more than 20 years and by all accounts, despite the 31 year age difference, were devoted to one another.  After Dean died, Margaret was at loose ends, seeking solace in endless cosmetic surgeries, designer clothes and religion.  She sold the newspaper chain in 1995, and she was reportedly worth as much as $100 million.

I was seated near her at a charity luncheon that day in 1995 and as she swept into the room you couldn’t help but notice her – Chanel suit, perfectly coiffed blonde hair and sparkly jewelry.  Lots of sparkly jewelry.  It was a Barbie doll look that I would come to know well when I moved to Scottsdale a few years later.  But at the time I looked at her as a mongoose might size up a snake – completely transfixed.  As a teenager she had been crowed “The Peach Queen” in her small Texas town and at age 62 she still had that beauty contestant strut.

Redone Margaret

Margaret,  at her marriage party on Valentine’s Day

I didn’t give Margaret much thought after that until I read about her death in 1997 at Bartlett Lake in Arizona.  Margaret had been a very lonely widow.  No amount of shopping or surgeries could make up for a lack of companionship.  So when she signed up for a high-end trail ride in May 1996, she was vulnerable to the charms of a 39 year old buffalo-taming rodeo cowboy, TC Thorstenson.  A more unlikely pair would be hard to imagine and Margaret’s friends and family thought it a passing fancy.  But as that year wore on, TC worked his charm on Margaret and she lavished him with gifts and affection – she was completely besotted.  That October, on a trip to Hawaii, TC proposed marriage and told her it was a one time only offer.  Margaret accepted the proposal.  What she didn’t know was TC had been married twice before, not once, as he had told her.  Moreover, his second wife had filed three complaints against him with the police for beating her.

Margaret’s friends and family were shocked when they learned of the marriage.  To sooth everyone she threw a lavish wedding party at her Orinda home on Valentine’s Day 1997, complete with TC’s buffalo performing stunts in the foyer.  Not long after that, TC convinced Margaret to buy a small ranch for $1.8M in North Scottsdale.  She moved there with him, redecorating it in a cowboy style that he loved and buying him more toys, including a $6,000 pool table.  TC occupied himself with his buddies and his horses, spending little time with Margaret.  By the end of April when friends from California came to visit, Margaret admitted to them that the marriage had been a mistake.  It was about this same time that Margaret became aware of TC’s second marriage and his history of abuse.

Margaret flew back to California in early May to attend a Lesher Foundation board meeting.  She also took the opportunity to meet with her attorney to pick up a proposed “post-nuptial” agreement that would sharply limit TC’s benefits in a divorce.  He had repeatedly refused to sign it when they had been in California and when she returned to Scottsdale with it in hand he again refused, causing a heated argument between them.

TC Thorstenson

TC Thorstenson, relaxing in Cave Creek

On Tuesday, May 13th, exactly four years to the day after Dean Lesher’s death, TC and Margaret took off for an impromptu camping trip up to Bartlett Lake.  They hitched the boat to their truck and took off in the late afternoon.  After tying the boat’s mooring line to a rock, they pitched camp away from the water, lit a campfire, and unrolled their sleeping bags.  From here on out, what really happened is open to conjecture.  Thorstenson said he woke at 3:30 a.m. to find that Margaret wasn’t in her sleeping bag. Thinking she might have gone to the truck to sleep, he looked for her there.  Eventually he gathered up their belongings and drove to the nearest sheriff’s station.  Later that day, Margaret’s body was found near the shoreline, clad only in her underwear and submerged in 8 feet of water.  The subsequent inquiry cleared TC and ruled her death an accident.  To this day Margaret’s friends and family are skeptical.

TC still lives in this area and continues to train horses.  He sold the ranch he bought with Margaret several years ago for over $8M.  In 2013 he opened a bar in Cave Creek, Hogs and Horses, which has since closed.   In 2014 two young women visited his bar and TC offered them free margaritas.  The women became separated and when one wanted to go home, TC offered to give her a lift.  Instead, he took her to his home and accosted her.  She was able to get away and later that night he was charged with indecent exposure, assault and varying degrees of DUI.

Some times the more things change, the more things stay the same.

 

 

Posted in opinion

STOP THE WORLD, I WANT TO GET OFF

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

I was incredibly excited as I watched the NASA/SpaceX astronauts speeding into the atmosphere last week.  As a person who grew up during the space age, I never tire of seeing a rocket launch.  The technology behind it all confounds me and I marvel at the bravery of the people who willingly jump into a hunk of metal and hurl into the great unknown.  As the week went on and they successfully met up with the International Space Station I found a new reason to admire them – they were no longer on Earth.  Let’s face it – it’s been a crappy year.  A really crappy year.  The notion of being able to leave Earth for a bit is very tantalizing.  I know I’m not alone.  Last week the financial giant Market Watch reported that anti-anxiety medication prescriptions have soared 34% during the COVID crisis.  Antidepressants and anti-insomnia drugs are also at all time highs.  There was some speculation that the pipeline of those drugs might dry up .  On the assumption that we might all need some coping mechanisms right now I decided to do some research on that topic for this week’s post.  I hope it helps.

Take breaks from watching, reading, or listening to news stories, including social media. Hearing about the pandemic repeatedly can be upsetting.  Okay Captain Obvious, we all KNOW that endless exposure to the news is not healthy.  That said, it’s been hard to turn away from the news as it’s the only source we have for getting up-to-date information about where the virus is and how it is progressing.  Add the protests and looting to the mix and it becomes akin to watching a train wreck – we just can’t look away.  That said, every expert I read advises that while it’s important to stay informed about current events, it’s just as important to take a break from it.  So, read a book, stream a movie, drink a pina colada while lounging in a hammock.

Take care of your body.  Take deep breaths, stretch, or meditate.  Try to eat healthy, well-balanced meals.  I’m including cake as part of that because it keeps me mentally well-balanced.  Exercise regularly, get plenty of sleep (even if it’s drug-induced).  The “experts” also advise to avoid alcohol and drugs.   I may have to draw the line here and, again, I’m not alone.  Liquor sales have soared during the pandemic.  The primary reason given is that because restaurants were shut down people were given no choice but to drink at home.  Okay, I’ll buy that.  But given the aforementioned increase in anti-anxiety drug use, I’m guessing it’s more self-medication.

Connect with others.  Endless articles have been written in the past few weeks about the importance of talking with someone you trust about your concerns and how you are feeling.  I have found this piece of advice to be the most important and the most difficult.  Many of us have relied on friends or family to fill the role of listener-in-chief.  But now I’m 6 feet apart from everyone.  I give elbow bumps where I once gave a hug.  I miss that.  And the problem is, as COVID has dragged on, most people don’t have much in reserve to cheer up anyone else.  As May drug into June I hesitated calling my girlfriends because I knew they were feeling as discouraged as I was.  It’s not fair to expect them to lift me up too. So who’s left?  The dog. It’s amazing how well Dash the Wonder Dog listens and then gives a little lick to let me know that I’ve been heard.  I’m not sure what to advise if you own a cat.  As a previous cat owner my guess is that the cat couldn’t give a shit less about your feelings.  All I know is that as we begin to open up a bit I’m looking forward to lunch with my girlfriends and a good hug.

Focus on the positive.  It’s easy to get down about all that’s going on but there are still plenty of things about which to be positive.  I’m convinced that the reason John Kraskinski’s Some Good News channel on YouTube was so wildly successful is that people crave to see all the good things that we do for one another.  If you haven’t watched it yet, do yourself a favor and tune in.  It will restore your faith in mankind.  SGN also does daily updates on Facebook and Instagram, which believe me, are the best things about those social media platforms.

Be grateful.  Yes, there are a lot of people hurting right now for a lot of different reasons. But most people have something for which to be grateful.  Admittedly, sometimes that “something” is quite small, but focusing on the positive can bring an attitude change that leads to a more hopeful perspective.  Sometimes when I’m feeling down I chide myself because I know deep down that I’m really quite fortunate in many, if not most, ways.  Still, it helps when I remember that old mantra, “I felt sorry for myself because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet.”  There is always someone worse off than you and often that person has a better attitude about it so…get over yourself and be grateful for what you have.

These five pieces of advice pretty much sum up every article I read.  I guess if all else fails we could train to be astronauts and get the heck off Earth.  In the mean time, be safe and be well, everyone!

Posted in opinion

THEY WERE SOLDIERS ONCE, AND YOUNG (2020)

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

This is my annual Memorial Day piece, written in remembrance of the boys from my high school who died in the Vietnam war. After I first published this in 2014, I heard from many people who related similar stories about the loss suffered in their home towns or, worse, their families. So this weekend, as you commemorate the holiday, please take a moment to remember all of the brave young men and women we’ve lost in conflict.

Five boys from my high school were killed in the Vietnam War. For a small town like Novato, that was an enormous number. We were such a close-knit community that even if we didn’t know one of them personally, we knew a sibling or friend. So on my trip to Washington D.C. last month I scheduled time to visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial to see their names on “The Wall”. To refresh my memory I pulled out my high school year books and found them all – smiling for a formal portrait or posing for a team picture. Each image reflected a boy, fresh-faced and full of hope, his life stretching out before him. I looked at those young faces and found it hard to believe that their lives ended so soon after the bucolic days captured in the photos. None of them reached the age of 22, their dreams extinguished on the battlefield. While we, their classmates, lived long enough to enjoy the internet, smart phones and streaming movies, most of them didn’t live long enough to see color television. I reflected on the stories I’ve read of WWII vets who speak so reverently of the “boys who didn’t come home”. As I perused the yearbooks I finally understood their sentiment. It is only when looking back through a 50 year lens that one can appreciate just how young these soldiers were and how many of life’s milestones they missed. So on this Memorial Day, I’d like to pay tribute to “The Boys from Novato”.

Robert Johnson
Bob Johnson joined the Army in the fall of 1965, in what would have been his Senior year in high school. I remember him as a quiet guy, but very nice. Before he enlisted he asked his high school sweetheart to marry him – it would give them both something to hang on to while he was gone. His entry into the service occurred just as the war was escalating. He was sent to Vietnam in March of 1966 and three weeks later he was killed by enemy gunfire during “Operation Abilene” in Phuoc Tuy Province. As his former classmates excitedly anticipated prom and graduation, Robert had already made the ultimate sacrifice. In the 1966 yearbook, where his senior portrait would have been, his mother placed this photo of him in uniform along with a tribute. He was the first Vietnam casualty from Novato.

 

Mike Tandy

Mike Tandy graduated from NHS in 1965. His sisters, Sue and Sarah, also attended NHS. Mike was very smart and participated in the first swim team our high school fielded. He was an Eagle Scout and according to his friend Neil Cuzner, “he was highly intelligent, a great guy and an excellent scout. He was in the Senior Patrol and a young leader of our troop. He lead by example”. After graduation Mike joined the Marine reserves and was called up in January, 1966. He was sent to Vietnam shortly after that. On September 8th he was on patrol in Quang Nam with another soldier when his footfall detonated a landmine. He was killed instantly. He had celebrated his 19th birthday just five days prior. His classmates had moved on – either to college or working – but the Tandy family was left to grieve the loss of their son and brother. In 2005 Sarah posted to the virtual Vietnam Wall: “Thanks to all of you who come here and remember Mike. All of our lives were changed and I thank you for not forgetting.”

 

Allan Nelson

Allan Nelson played football at College of Marin with my brother, Bob. Allan’s sister, Joanne, was in Bob’s class and his brother, Steve, was in mine. So we were well aware when Allan was drafted into the Army and sent to Vietnam in July, 1966 at the age of 20. Five months later, on December 1, we were devastated to learn he had been killed by gunfire during a battle in Binh Dinh Province. I still remember the day Steve came to school after Allan’s death; red-faced with tears streaming down his cheeks. He had always been such a happy guy but was now changed in ways that were hard for 16 year-old kids to understand. As I look back now, I can’t imagine what it must have been like for him to go home from school each day and face parents who were shattered by grief. Joanne posted the following on a memorial page and perhaps sums it up the best: “Allan was my brother, not just a brother, he was my best friend. All I know is December 1, 1966 was the saddest time for me and my family. My family loved each other so much, but when Al was killed the joy died in my family. Allan had his whole life planned. He had just turned 21 on Oct. 20th. When we were young, he couldn’t wait to be 21. I am so sorry for all the families that lost a son and a brother. It will be 33 years in Dec. The everyday sad feelings of loss are gone but on special days it still hurts.”

Jim Gribbin

Jim Gribbin graduated from NHS in 1966. He was on the football team and very active in school clubs and was well-liked by everyone who knew him. He joined the Army Reserves and when called up, became part of the Special Forces where he rose to the rank of Captain. He served two tours of duty in an elite MIKE unit. In March 1970 his unit was on a night defensive mission in Kontum Province when they were ambushed by enemy troops. Jim sacrificed his own safety by running into open territory – twice – to aid and retrieve wounded soldiers under his command. He was shot both times and taken to a rear medical facility where he died from his wounds. Ironically, for this affable Irishman, he succumbed on St. Patrick’s Day. He was awarded the Silver Star and the Bronze Star for Valor. Jim’s dad was a veteran of WWII who died in 2011. He requested to be placed in the same grave with Jim, with his name and vitals carved on the back of Jim’s headstone. One can only imagine the grief that he carried all those years. Hopefully he is at peace now that they are forever reunited. A complete stranger paid tribute to Jim in 2018 on the date of his death. You can read my post about it here: https://fromabirdseyeview.com/?p=7111

Wayne Bethards

Wayne “Ed” Bethards was in my graduating class, but I didn’t know him well. His family moved to Novato just before the start of our senior year. His mother, Betty Bethards, was the author of the international best-seller, “The Dream Book”. Again, Neil Cuzner has provided a bit more insight: “Wayne was a good person. He had a great love of baseball and had actually started a small league while over in Nam. He was sharing his love of baseball with the Vietnamese children.” Cuzner went on to say that Wayne was a religious person and did not want to kill anyone; he struggled greatly with his deployment. He was drafted into the Army and was sent to Vietnam in October of 1970. In January, 1971, he was killed while on patrol by the accidental detonation of a mechanical device in Quang Tin Province. He was the last boy from Novato High School to die in the war.

 

Jerry Sims

In April, 2017, I heard from a former schoolmate, Dennis Welsh, about Jerry Sims, a boy who died in the conflict whose hometown was listed as Novato. I found in my research that sometimes the Novato “hometown” designation were for those affiliated with Hamilton Air Force Base, not graduates of Novato High School. Since there were no records of Jerry at NHS I assumed Jerry was from Hamilton, but that was not the case. Dennis told me that Jerry moved to Novato from Texas in the Spring of 1966 to live with his sister. He tried out for the football team during spring training and made the squad. But despite that automatic inclusion into a social group, he was unhappy living in California and being the “new kid” going into his Senior year. Dennis said that he never saw him again after football tryouts and didn’t learn of his fate until he spotted Jerry’s name on “The Wall”. The fact is that Jerry left Novato and joined the Army in June, 1966 and was sent to Vietnam in November. On February 6, 1968 he and several others in his unit were killed by small arms fire in Gia Dinh province. Jerry was 19 years old. His former platoon leader said this on his memorial page: “I was Jerry’s platoon leader on the day he died. He didn’t have to be there, since he had a job elsewhere in Vietnam, but he requested a transfer. He had already spent a year with the Wolfhounds, but for reasons all his own, he wanted to come back to this unit. He died doing his job as a squad leader in my platoon.” It would seem Jerry finally found his home – and some peace – with his Army brethren.

When I visited “The Wall” I found the boys from Novato, each name etched on that long expanse of granite. I thought about their families and the sorrow they endured. It was overwhelming to realize that same sorrow replicated 58,286 times. Each of the names on that black, shiny surface represent a family forever destroyed. As I walked along the pathway I looked at all of the mementos that were left as tributes to the fallen – notes, flowers and flags mostly. But then I spotted something different – a tribute from Jim Dart to his brother, Larry. It was a Kingston Trio album (pictured left), along with a note about the good times they shared learning the guitar and singing songs together. I was overcome with emotion reading Jim’s note. My brother, Bob, owned that same album. He and his best friend, Don, often entertained our family playing their guitars and singing songs from that record. Bob was a Naval officer in Japan during the Vietnam war and was safely returned to us. I wept as I stood looking at the album, realizing that but for the grace of God – and military orders – how easily it could have been Bob’s name on that wall and me leaving a Kingston Trio album in his memory. I can’t imagine what our family would have been like without him. I ached for Sue and Sarah and Joanne and Steve and all the other siblings who never got to see gray hair on their brother’s head; their family gatherings forever marred by a gaping hole where their brother should have been. When I stooped down to take the photo I noticed that several other visitors had stopped to look at it too. As I glanced at those who were of a certain age I could see my own feelings reflected in their eyes. We know how much of life these boys missed. We mourn their loss – and ours.

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*YOUR* GOOD

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

There have been many collective revelations over the past several weeks, but a new appreciation for teachers certainly ranks near the top.  Parents who have been required to work from home, with all the technological hiccups that engenders, have also been expected to home school their children.  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that wine sales have soared in the past two months.  If I were the head of the teacher’s union I’d be forming a strategy for pay raises.  In fact, low pay was one of the primary reasons I decided not to become a teacher.  That, and I have little patience, which seems to be a requirement for working with six year old children.  Twenty years ago I was president of a non-profit organization that paired business people with local elementary schools.  We spent an hour a week reading to an underperforming child.  I loved it and an hour a week was enough to scratch my teacher itch.  But once a year we “played” at being the principal for a day.  I shadowed the principal, dealt with teacher/student issues, heard about heart-breaking home situations from CPS and tried to reconcile the annual budget.  I couldn’t even make it a full day.  After four hours I fled back to my comfortable office.  I am not proud of that, but it forever cemented for me that I had made the right career decision.

I had some good and bad teachers over the years.  I suspect that’s true for everyone.  Like any other profession, there is a wide range of talent and effectiveness among educators.  I was lucky enough to have three teachers whose examples, guidance and talent have stuck with me all my life.  Of the three, the very best was my high school English teacher, Bette Reese.  Until I landed in her class I was a middling student, with low self-confidence and grades to match.  I was more focused on boys and socializing than schoolwork.  Ms. Reese was a task master, constantly correcting grammar, spelling and composition.  She introduced me to Hemingway, Camus and Dostoevsky – pretty heady stuff for a high school junior.  I so wanted to please her that I found myself working harder and – miracle of miracles  – I became an “A” student.  Ms. Reese and I formed a friendship – I introduced her to Rod McKuen, the poet laureate of 60’s pop culture, and she took me under her wing, helping me to better appreciate good writing and the importance of using correct grammar.  I was lucky enough to be in her Advanced English class my Senior year, where my education was further honed by her unrelenting, steely resolve to make something of me.

 

I’ve been thinking of Ms. Reese during this lock-down as I have spent more time watching the news and reading social media.  I’ve been appalled by the number of people unable to write a cogent sentence.  In general, I am a bit of a stickler for grammar (although regular readers of this blog can attest that I make quite a few errors), but I’ve been brought to the brink of insanity the past two months.  Facebook, Instagram, Twitter – they are all swamplands of bad grammar.   The most common mistake I see is people confusing “your” with “you’re”.  Clearly they were behind the schoolhouse door the day that contractions were discussed.  I wish I had a nickel for every time someone has posted “Your the best” or “Your going to love this!”.  Ugh. There is no escaping the your/you’re error.  We received an invitation to a tony club opening in Northern California where the front of the card screamed, “YOUR INVITED”.  How many managers had to review that advertisement before it went to the printer?  I decided if they weren’t smart enough to know the English language I wasn’t dumb enough to give them my money.   TV news readers make so many grammatical errors that I can’t decide whether they skipped journalism school altogether or their scripts are written by a third grade dropout.  Whatever the excuse, it’s clear they never learned the difference between “well” and “good”. The reports on the COVID pandemic have generated a common question asked of or by reporters: “How are you doing?”.  About 1,000 times in the past two months the answer has been, “I’m doing good.”.  OMG – NO!  “Good” is used only as an adjective, as in, she makes a good Christmas cookie.  “Well” is an adjective or adverb, as in, I don’t feel well after eating her damned Christmas cookie.  

I wish everyone had been fortunate enough to have had a Ms. Reese in their lives.  There is nothing better than a teacher who instills an appreciation for a subject that gets buried deep in your soul.  Ms. Reese left my high school two years after I graduated and became an English and Journalism professor at College of Marin.  She eventually became the faculty advisor to the student newspaper where no doubt she used her magic on many aspiring journalists.  Sadly, Bette Reese died in 1979 at the age of 44 from pancreatic cancer.  To this day the college awards the Bette Reese Memorial Scholarship to a talented journalism student.  I can only hope they are maintaining her high standards, but I’m not optimistic.  If Ms. Reese were still alive she could make a fortune correcting the grammar of most journalists.  But I guess the point of a good teacher is that we carry on for them, sharing the knowledge they so generously shared with us.  So in the name of Bette Reese I’m going to continue to scream at the infractions on the news channels and social media.  Somewhere, somehow, I just know Ms. Reese is cheering me on.

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AND NOW…THE NEWS…THE GOOD NEWS

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Tyler Merrill

These past weeks have been trying…trying to kill us, trying our patience and trying to test our resolve.  Shoot – bad news was easy to come by even before COVID-19 hit us.  When is the last time you read a paper or watched the news and felt better afterwards?  My guess is it was sometime in the 80’s.  Which is why I want to devote today’s post to just that – people who give us something to cheer about.  I was inspired about a month ago, at the beginning of the virus outbreak, when I saw an interview with Tyler Merrill, the CEO of a clothing company, who stopped all production to focus on making medical grade masks for hospital workers.  He was appalled at the price gouging and competitive out-bidding going on and decided to take matters into his own hands to produce N-95 grade masks.  I was impressed by his generous effort.  His interview recalled something I know down deep – how good the ordinary, everyday citizens are in this country.  I felt bad that I needed reminding but it felt good to know that spirit still exists.  And then last week I discovered John Krasinski’s Good News Channel (or SGN as he calls it) on YouTube and my confidence is the goodness of people was solidified.

A Classic

In full disclosure, I have been in love with John Krasinski since his character, Jim Halpert, encased Dwight Schrute’s stapler in a mound of gleaming lime Jello on the first episode of The Office.  I’ve followed his career and enjoyed his personal high jinks, most notably his “prank wars” with Jimmy Kimmel.  If you need a laugh look them up on You Tube.  I’ve always enjoyed him and his particular brand of humor but I have new-found respect for him since viewing SGN.  In March he posted on his Twitter feed that we’d heard enough sad news and that he wanted people to send him some good news stories.  His feed was flooded with them in hours.  Which gave him the insight to know that people are really looking for positive stories and that there is no shortage of them out there.  So on March 29th he launched SGN.  So far he has produced five episodes.  “Produced” might be a bit of a stretch, as even he admits.  He is recording the show from his home office, with the colorful SGN sign his daughters drew as his only graphic.

John Krasinski on SGN

On each show he not only shows his humanity, but that of all Americans.  He lauds the front line health care workers, as well as other essential workers – transit drivers, utility workers, street sweepers.  He has surprised COVID health care workers in Boston with a trip to Fenway Park, complete with VIP treatment.  He has had Brad Pitt to do the weather and when he threw a prom for all high school seniors who are missing out on that rite of passage, he brought in the Jonas Brothers and Billie Eilish.  His interview with his old cohort Steve Carrell was both funny and touching.  But it’s his “Restoring Faith to All Humanity” segments that are worth their weight in gold because they feature ordinary people doing extraordinary things.  One episode featured a teenage cancer patient who celebrated her last treatment with a socially-distanced welcome home in her neighborhood that was so touching that I defy you to watch it without tearing up.  Another episode featured a young mailman who has 400 mostly elderly residents on his route, so he gave each of them a flyer offering to run errands or grocery shop for them in his spare time.  Most of them took him up on the offer.  I could go on and on with examples, but really, you need to watch the show for yourself.  I GUARANTEE that you will feel uplifted and optimistic afterwards.  There is also an SGN Facebook page that you can follow that features daily updates of good stories.  Watch SGN and you will be reminded that there are far more good people than bad out there and most of us are willing to pitch in and help without hesitation.  As one of the International Space Station astronauts said on SGN – “An Earth in crisis is still an Earth worth returning to.”

Finally, tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo and I couldn’t resist sharing this meme.  I hope you all find a way to have a Corona without getting Corona!

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I’M IN LOVE WITH PERRY MASON

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Raymond Burr, as Perry Mason

Well, here we are…still.  I hope you are all doing well and haven’t killed your spouse yet.  Okay, that might be a bit drastic but I’ve been influenced by crime TV during my “staycation”.  Specifically, I’ve been spending a lot of time with Perry Mason, the TV show from the 50’s and 60’s.  Some things have not changed much in the intervening years – just as with ther current show, Dateline, the spouse is almost always the perpetrator.  Hopefully, you are still experiencing wedded bliss and Keith Morrison won’t be knocking on your front door anytime soon.  But…back to Perry.  I stumbled across the series as I was surfing our 450 channels for something to watch.  As it happens, Family Entertainment TV (don’t worry – I’d never heard of it either) was starting the series from the beginning.  What the heck?  I figured out that to watch the entire series from beginning to end without any breaks takes up 10 days. Heck, I don’t have anything else to do.  Plus, I relished the idea of taking a trip down memory lane recalling those wonderful Saturday nights when I watched the show, intrigued not with Raymond Burr, who played Perry, but with his “confidential secretary”, Della Street.

William Talman, sad sack Hamilton Burger

It has been interesting watching the series as an adult. Obviously, beyond the tail fins on cars and the lack of cell phones, the biggest change has been the role of women. There was a woman judge in a few episodes but no female attorneys. Mostly, women played murderers or victims. But still, it turns out that the show influenced a good share of women.  Sonja Sotomayor, the Supreme Court justice, was one.  In her autobiography she says she was hooked on the law when during one episode Perry asked the prosecutor, Hamilton Burger, if he wasn’t troubled that he had spent so much time prosecuting Perry’s client only to find he was innocent. “My job as a prosecutor is to do justice,” Sotomayor quotes the prosecutor as saying. “And justice is served when a guilty man is convicted and an innocent man is not.”

That prosecutor was Hamilton Burger, who lost all but three cases to Perry.  Makes you wonder how the guy kept his job.  Turns out that William Talman, who played Burger, didn’t keep his job.  He was fired by CBS March 18, 1960, hours after he entered a not-guilty plea to misdemeanor charges related to his presence at a party that was raided by police for marijuana use. Back then they did not consider marijuana an “essential” business.  The shooting schedule was immediately juggled to minimize Talman’s presence on the show.  CBS would not relent, even after the charges were dropped.  In December 1960, after millions of fans protested, he returned to the show where he would remain until the end of the series.  Now that I’ve watched three seasons of the show I think I’ve figured out why he was so inept – every week he used the same line when objecting to Perry’s questioning of his witness: “Your honor, this entire line of questioning is incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial”.  Really, every frigging week he says the same thing.   Wouldn’t you think he – or the writer’s – could come up with something else?  No wonder he lost all those cases.

Della Street and Paul Drake

Paul Drake, Perry’s private detective, was the most fun character on the show.  He did all the dirty work – sneaking into office buildings, tailing a suspect or flying somewhere to gather background “dirt”.  Each week he seemed to get in and out of some perilous situations, often involving a beautiful woman.  Drake was played by William Hopper, whose mother was Hedda Hopper, the famous gossip columnist.  He was a big hunk of a guy and I always suspected that Della was torn between her crush on Perry and him.  Or maybe that was just my youthful imagination.  But back to Della.  She was played by Barbara Hale and I idolized her when I was growing up.  She had wonderful clothes, was smart as a whip, and she always got to stay in the room with Perry when a client spilled their guts.   I thought she had the perfect job.  Of course, now I realize that she was probably grossly underpaid, especially given that she seemed to be at Perry’s beck and call at all hours of the night.  Which makes me wonder how she afforded all those fabulous clothes. Nevertheless, Della was not just a secretary, although she fetched her share of coffee, but someone who Perry listened to and who often gave him the logic or clue needed to solve the case.

I just read that HBO is coming out with a new Perry Mason film in June, starring Matthew Rhys as Perry.  It will focus on the early days of his career, before he became a high-priced defense attorney.  I’ll keep an open mind, but I don’t know how it can possibly be better than the TV show.  No Hamilton Burger, no one in the gallery shouting “I did it!  I killed him.” at the last minute, and most importantly, no Della Street.  Somehow, that just seems wrong.