1. Most of my contact with my friends who follow the principles of the Republican Party or the Tea Party or who are Libertarians and who oppose President Obama occurs on Facebook. I had dinner tonight at Billy Mac's this evening with friends who support President Obama and are Democrats. I'm mostly a listener. These days I don't get that riled up about politics, although I did express happiness that Kitzhaber is our governor again. I enjoy living a life with friends and family whose convictions are so various. This situation always reminds me that I am in agreement and disagreement with people I love and that if my friends and family represent a fair sampling of the USA as a whole, good people occupy the entire spectrum of how to see and live in the world.
2. I didn't think I'd turned on my headlights when driving to Billy Mac's from home. It was perfectly light out when Molly, Olivia, and I headed over. But, when the Deke and Molly and Olivia left the restaurant to drive back home together, Molly returned to report my lights were on. It was weird. I would have thought that my battery would be dead and the lights would be dim after being on for over an hour. But, no. The lights were strong and my car started right up. Weird.
3. The death of Sparky Anderson is not a beautiful thing, unless, as I think it did, it relieved Sparky of a life of dementia he'd rather not have had. But, remembering Sparky Anderson has been beautiful and fun. I went to YouTube and listened to a profanity laced rant of Sparky's he gave after he'd gotten betrayed by a member of the media. I also watched a video of the 25th anniversary celebration of the 1984 Tigers and then watched some highlights of the World Series itself and immensely enjoyed remembering Jack Morris, Milt Wilcox, Alan Trammel, Lou Whitaker, Lance Parrish, Darrell Evans, Larry Herndon, Tom Brookens, Chet Lemon, Kirk Gibson, Aurelio Lopez, Willie Hernandez (Cy Young winner), and the rest of that team. The summer and fall of 1984 were very memorable for me because of love, moving back to Eugene, returning to grad school, and other reasons and the Tigers were a key part of what I loved about that spring, summer, and fall. Watching those highlights brought back much more than just baseball memories.
Bonus: Yesterday, Rick Wainright compared the '84 Tigers to the '10 Giants and it's a great comparison. The Tiger team was younger and stronger up the middle in the field with Parrish, Whitaker, Trammel, and Gibson. But in looking back at the Tiger's roster, they had a significant number of players who were castoffs, players picked up off of the MLB junk pile: Darrell Evans, Chet Lemon, Ruppert Jones, Milt Wilcox, Johnny Grubb, Aurelio Lopez, Doug Bair, Sid Monge and others. I'm remembering how much I enjoyed seeing these veterans, near or at the end of their careers, many of them refugees from lousy clubs, winning a World Series ring.
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