An Arkies Musings

My An Arkie's Faith column from the December 28, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. It's Christmas Eve, and the house is a bustle of activity. The kitchen has been busy all day as my wife and daughter have been preparing our Christmas Eve feast. The tradition in our family is to have Christmas Dinner on Christmas Eve, followed by a special Christmas breakfast the next morning. Flour covers the kitchen table as homemade rolls, pumpkin pie, and apple pie are prepared. Even though it is a cold day, it is hot in the kitchen as both ovens, and the stovetop are in use.  When we sat down to eat, there was so much food that it would not fit on the table. On the sideboard were roast beef, dressing, creamed corn, mounds of mashed potatoes, gravy, homemade cranberry sauce, rolls, and pies. Because I lack even a tiny amount of self-control when it comes to food, I ate until I was stuffed. I had been eating way too much all week. It is a Christmas hazard. I baked cookies and made almond ...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the December 21, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. As I sit at the computer this evening writing, the lights on the Christmas tree are sparkling in the window, and Christmas music is playing. We have just returned home after a day of Christmas shopping. During the Christmas season, we focus on giving good gifts. We spend a lot of money and time finding the right gifts for people who are essential in our lives. Did you have any great gift ideas this year? Was there a gift that you are particularly excited to give? Sometimes we fail in our gift-giving. Have you had any gift-giving disasters? One Christmas, when my son was a young boy, we nearly ruined his Christmas with one of his gifts. One of his jobs was sweeping the kitchen floor. That Christmas, we bought a stick vacuum cleaner and thought it would be funny to give it to him as a gift. The vacuum, wrapped in beautiful paper, was the biggest present under the tree. When my son saw that the bigg...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the December 14, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. The audience filed into the spacious auditorium and quickly found seats. As I sat down and looked around, I noticed life-size marble statues that looked like they were from ancient Greece and Rome surrounding the auditorium. The ceiling, high overhead, was inky black with tiny points of light, mimicking a starry, moonless night sky. It was as if I had been transported to a 15th-century Italian courtyard. I am in the historic Saenger Theatre on Canal Street in New Orleans. The theatre was built in the 1920s and opened in 1927. The opulent theater was exceptionally ornate with marble, crystal chandeliers, oil paintings, and sumptuous seating for 4,000. A magnificent organ accompanied silent films, and vaudeville acts drew large crowds. In the 30s, the theatre was updated to show talking movies. After closing in the 70s and reopening in the 80s, the theatre housed a variety of events, from live perf...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the December 7, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. Growing up in Colorado, I remember occasionally seeing shepherds with their flocks of sheep when we traveled in the mountains. I thought that being a shepherd looked like fun. You got to spend your time outdoors in the beautiful Colorado mountains. The shepherd's tiny little trailers looked so homey and quaint. When I got older and became an avid newspaper reader, I read some stories that showed the darker side of being a shepherd in Colorado. Most of the shepherds are foreigners who can seldom talk to family back home. They live without any human company for months at a time. The shepherds have no water, toilet, shower, or place to wash clothes. Most live in small, 6x10-foot trailers with just enough room to sleep, a small wood-burning stove, and little else. Some have an outhouse nearby, but many do not. Before World War II, most of Colorado's shepherds were Americans. But by the early 1...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the November 23, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. Thanksgiving is fast approaching, and I am getting excited. We will be heading to Ashland, Missouri, on Thursday morning to celebrate Thanksgiving with my sister and her family. Thanksgiving is such a fantastic holiday. To me, Thanksgiving is a holiday that focuses on family even more than Christmas. I am very thankful for my family. How we celebrate Thanksgiving in America has its roots in British harvest festivals and U.S. history. In 1620, a group of more than 100 Puritans fleeing religious persecution settled in a town called Plymouth in what is now Massachusetts. The Pilgrims' first winter was so harsh that fewer than 50 survived the season. The following spring, Native Americans taught them how to get sap from the maple trees and plant corn and other crops. The harvest was successful, and the Pilgrims had enough food for the winter. Plymouth Colony's Governor, William Bradford, deci...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the November 16, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. Ehrich Weiss was a remarkable man. By the time he died, he was famous around the world. But until recently, I had never heard of him. He was born to Hungarian-Jewish parents in Budapest, Austria, in 1874. In 1878 his family came to America, settling in Appleton, Wisconsin. Ehrich's father was a Rabbi and served the Zion Reform Jewish Congregation in Appleton. When he was 13, Ehrich moved with his father to New York City. There, he became interested in the trapeze, calling himself "Ehrich, the prince of the air." Ehrich also tried his hand as a professional magician and renamed himself, Harry Houdini. I am sure you are familiar with the name Houdini. He was not successful as a magician, but he soon drew attention for his feats of escape using handcuffs. In 1893, he married fellow performer Wilhelmina Beatrice Rahner, who would serve as his lifelong stage assistant, Bess Houdini. Ehri...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the November 9, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. The black road seemed to soak up the light from the headlights as the Hyundai wound its way down the crooked northwest Arkansas road. Heavy rain pelted the car as the windshield wipers struggled to keep up with the deluge of water hitting the windshield. I tightened my grip on the steering wheel as I tried to see ahead into the darkness.  Bright lights shone in my rearview mirror, making me nervous. "Why is that car tailgating me when the conditions are so treacherous," I thought. Occasionally the black of the stormy night was illuminated with streaks of bold light as lightning lit the road for a few seconds. For a moment, I could see just how narrow the road was. There were no shoulders, and trees lined the edge of the road. As I guided the car around yet another curve, suddenly, I saw a large tree branch across the road. I veered hard to the left and squeezed between the branch and a l...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the November 2, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. My mini golden doodle, Tucker, was frantic. He didn't know what was happening, but he knew he didn't like it. Loud banging and scraping sounds were coming from the roof over the bedroom. Tucker was jumping and whining. No matter what we did, he would not settle down. He was sure that the sky was falling.  The noise came from workers on the roof who were scraping off the old shingles directly above the bedroom. On another part of the roof, other workers were nailing new shingles. Even though the activity on the roof distressed Tucker, it made me happy. Finally, after a five-year ordeal, we were getting a new roof on our house. During an intense thunderstorm five years ago, hail damaged our roof. The next time it rained, we noticed several leaks in the house. I called our insurance company, and they sent an adjuster to inspect the damage. The adjuster decided that the damage was minimal and ...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the October 26, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. The mornings had been cooler for a few days, but this morning was downright cold. A cold blast of air blew right through me as I walked out the front door, heading to work. When I arrived at my shop, I glanced at the thermometer that hung next to the front door. It read 26 degrees. I shivered, as just knowing the temperature made me even colder. "It is too cold for the middle of October," I thought. I entered my shop and immediately turned on the 220-volt, 5000-watt space heater. It was the first time I had used the heater since a major renovation of my shop. The heater had taken the chill out of the air in just a few minutes, and I was comfortable working. Before long, it was warm enough to turn down the heater. I'm not too fond of cold weather, but I was excited to see how well my shop would stay warm. This spring, I started working on my cold, drafty shop. The building is old and ...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the October 19, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. Harold wasn't at the hospital the day his son was born; his job had taken him out of state. But he didn't miss the birth on purpose. His wife Sandra's due date was two months away. Earlier that day, Sandra had driven him to the airport to catch a flight to Atlanta. On her way home, she began to have premature labor pain and went straight to the hospital, where baby Josh was born just a few hours later. Because of his premature birth, baby Josh needed special care. Later that day, Sandra called Harold at his Atlanta hotel to tell him that he had a son and that baby Josh would need extended care. It wouldn't be the last time that Harold missed a milestone moment in his son's life. Harold's professional future was looking very bright, but his home life was deteriorating. A couple of years earlier, he had been an out-of-work documentary filmmaker. Sandra remembered those days, ...

My An Arkie's Faith column from the October 12, 2022, issue of The Polk County Pulse. For many years, whenever I traveled to Russellville, Jasper, Harrison, or Branson, I would pass by a large open field with what looked like hundreds of RV camping spaces on Hwy 250. There was a small sign that said Turkey Track Bluegrass music. I wondered why it was there and why I never saw anyone there.  One day a couple of years ago, I saw a flyer advertising the Turkey Track Bluegrass Festival. I thought that it sounded interesting. I love music, but I had never attended a bluegrass festival. The timing didn't work out, so I couldn't attend the festival. Each year, in the back of my mind, I thought about attending the festival, but it never seemed to happen. I decided that I would try to go to Turkey Track this year. A few days ago, a Facebook post on my phone showed that Rhonda Vincent would be playing at Turkey Track. I had heard her play at Silver Dollar City in the 80s and followed...