Birthday dreams and Hawkeye pain... and opportunities for great stories

It was a fun evening yesterday, celebrating Anna's 17th birthday at her parents' home, enjoying a lasagna dinner with tiramisu dessert prepared by Ian, her dad. We talked a bit about her latest story assignment for the school magazine on the tenth anniversary of the Dec. 13, 2013 shooting that left one innocent young woman dead and her murderer (another senior at Arapahoe) dead by his own hand. She has already conducted a couple in-depth interviews with some teachers who vividly recall the events, having lived through them.

Well, that discussion doesn't sound like much fun, now that I think about it, but it's always great to have a serious discussion about how to report on something with my granddaughters. After all, that allows me to revisit what I did for decades with my own journalism students. 

Granddaughter #1, Grace, just had her 27th news story published on The Daily Iowan news site, with at least of three of those articles also appearing the print version of the paper. For all her earlier education, including four years as part of various aspects of the Arapahoe media program, she is still learning to report and write "news," and that is a great reminder that high school just can't be the end of our educations. We need guided practice and repetition and feedback and continuous motivation. 

BTW: I think Grace gets paid $15 per story, no matter the length or time involved in reporting, which means she has earned a whopping $405 total this semester due to her efforts. That's better than the zero dollars she earned during four years of high school journalism, but still... That doesn't amount to a very good part time job.

But she is learning to write, on the job and in public, and she continues to improve and anticipate what to ask and where to go for information. That is priceless.

Anna is on a similar journey, but this coverage of a tragic anniversary and how the school community has found ways to become stronger, more supportive, and generally friendlier is likely her most important assignment in the past two years plus. She is doing real journalism, all while balancing a full load of challenging classes. 

There was a negative last night, unfortunately. The Iowa women lost their first game of the year to a very physical Kansas State team, with All-World Caitlin Clark having an off night. There are rumors online that she was ill, which might explain her fatigue and flat performance. She tried to play through it but to no avail. 

Grace was in the sell-out crowd and I'm sure felt some disappointment. But life does not spin out in a continuous upward line of a graph. It's good to be reminded of that and of how disappointments can often become key steps that lead to future successes. 

Iowa fans are all too aware of the ups and downs of athletics. For instance, the football team's best player, Cooper Dejean, broke some bones in his foot during practice this week and will miss the rest of the season. His absence could be an excuse if the Hawks drop tomorrow's home finale with Illinois, of course. But it could be that his replacement will rise to the occasion and that others will pick up the slack.

Ms. Clark will have better days -- it's hard to imagine a worse one for her -- so things will only get brighter for the women. 

Anna will encounter unforeseen difficulties in putting her two-or three-spread coverage onto the pages of The Herald. Sources will flake. Photos will not be found from a decade ago (she learned that the hard drive which contained the back up images was stolen). But I suspect Arapahoe readers will be fascinated to learn more about a traumatic story and how their community rallied. 

It's not much of a story when there are no challenges to overcome. And overcoming those challenges is key to having some fun.

Is it a little pitiful to look forward to far-off games on TV?

As we head into winter, with less daylight and chilly temps and a renewed appreciation for our little fireplace in the living room, Kathleen and I welcome the somewhat regular televised Iowa basketball games into our home.

Last night it was the women scrapping their way to victory over a very strong Virginia Tech team (both teams made the Final Four last spring), with Caitlin Clark having an "off night" and still producing 44 points. She could easily have had double digit assists, as well, but we had some difficulties with layups. Some of that could have been due to a 6'6" center altering shots.

The game was played in North Carolina, billed as a special event, and it drew not only a national audience on ESPN but over 15,000 to the arena. This was reportedly the largest crowd for a women's basketball game ever in the Tar Heel state. The TV announcers claimed that not only are all Iowa women's games in Carver Hawkeye sold out, but that many of their away games are also selling out. 

They called this "Clarkenomics," based on the incredible revenue that all those sold out games and events can generate. Last night's game produced nearly $3 million in associated revenue for the Charlotte area and each team was paid a cool $150,000 just to show up and play. In November. It's a bit nutty.

We have joined on the screen so many of those Iowa women over the past decade (thanks, Big Ten Network) that we feel we have some sort of relationship to favorites like Kate Martin... I know. It's completely one-sided and artificial, but we honestly care, and not just about victories. 

It's a weird sort of bonus to know that Grace will be attending most home games this season, enjoying some of the same excitement as we used to for many years with our own season tickets (but only to men's games, back then).

Speaking of men, the men's team has its second game tonight and we haven't seen them play as of yet, but there are some new players, including some freshmen, and it won't be long until we are in the grasp of the full range of emotions as the team battles with its opponents. 

I'm not sure I can measure the feeling, but I am certain that I am a little bit happier after an Iowa win than after a loss. It's not logical, but it's clear that winning beats losing. I know. That's quite the insight.

The same lack of logic will apply to tomorrow's Iowa-Rutgers football game, pitting two mediocre teams (though the Hawks are 7-2 and could end up playing in the Big Ten Championship game in December) with two unproductive offenses against one another. 

The best athletic teams (like the Iowa women) combine "style points" with the actual scores to provide entertainment to vast crowds. But the beauty of sports is that one of the teams will win (the exception is regular season soccer, of course), no matter the skill levels and entertainment value. 

I wouldn't say I "live and die" with the Hawks -- after all, I suffered through 17 consecutive losing seasons in the woe begotten 1970s and 80s... and survived -- but I continue to root strongly for teams I only see on TV. Old habits die hard, I suppose.

As an Iowa fan, I am well aware that my dreams will always be squashed at some point. That one of my teams will underperform at the exact wrong time and not reach the pinnacle. But Iowa fans relish being the underdog, the underappreciated... at least a bit. 

The state of Iowa in the past decade has disappointed me in so many ways, mostly politically, but at least there are athletics, and not just at UI. Another bleak winter is looming, but Iowa fans can join in a mystical communion, warmed by TV screens.

Now, if only some of our friends and neighbors could shake the Trump cult. In the meantime... Go, Hawks!

Sports provide terrific material for storytelling

Another high school volleyball season ended for granddaughter Anna last night, with the team dropping both matches in its three-team regional. The first contest was with the fifth-seed Mountain Vista, which is led by Bridget Malone, who has played for U.S. national teams and was terrific. The PA announcer must have gotten a bit bored repeating "Bridget Malone... KILL!" I certainly did.

She is a six-foot junior who can jump. Her mother played volleyball for Providence and her father happens to be the coach of the Denver Nuggets. She is gifted genetically. Vista is blessed to have her live in its attendance area. I felt lucky to see her in action.

The second match was with an opponent, Lakewood, that was not all that better than Arapahoe, though seeded higher, 20 to 31 (of 36 total in 5A). That match started so well, with Anna's team racing out to an 18-9 lead. Then things fell apart, with Lakewood storming back to win 25-23... and the Warriors seemed to lose interest in continuing their mediocre season, dropping the final two sets.

Kathleen and I did what we have done over a dozen times this fall: sit on uncomfortable bleachers in a poorly lighted gym, this time with bizarre and deafening country rock music played every time there was a timeout. There oughta be a law...

Anna plays middle hitter and only in the front row, so she is on the bench about half of each match. You would think that I would lose interest and woolgather much the way I do during most sermons at church (another topic entirely), but the longer the season went on, the more I came to care about the performances and emotions and personalities of the players. I don't really know any of them, and yet...

There is the sophomore libero, who spent the first half of the season on the bench behind a senior... until the senior messed up her knee and had to have surgery. From that point, she rarely left the court. Last night, during the very first point of the very first set, she hustled so hard after an errant dig that she slid head-on into the back wall of the gym. Luckily, it was padded, but she clearly was concussed (and her neck obviously was jolted). She shook it off, as athletes universally attempt to do, and stayed in the match. But she made uncharacteristically bad plays in the back row, was increasingly inconsistent with her serving (hitting half of them into the net), and was generally moving erratically. 

It was clear from the top row of the bleachers that she needed to go to urgent care but there seemed to be no trainers in the gym -- during a playoff? -- and the coaches were eager to take her at her word that she was fine. After all, there were no kids sitting on the bench who could replace her. 

So much for the cliche promises that coaches always make about keeping the health and safety of their players foremost in their minds. In the end, not having her parents take her to the emergency room mattered not a whit; we lost all six sets in the two matches.

I hope her folks eventually had her checked out.

Anna suffered her own (thankfully) minor injury, though not sports-related, as she got her pinkie caught in her car door as she ran out between matches for something... and suddenly we saw some tape around two fingers on her left hand. There was a small cut, apparently, and it didn't affect her play. But I couldn't help focus on that bit of white tape during the entire second match. She and her parents came for pizza at our house after the matches and she seemed fine, inhaling pepperoni as if she would never eat again. I guess I shouldn't have worried, I guess. 

I could share impressions of each player on the team, based on her play and her attitude on the bench and with teammates. They all experienced moments of greatness and humiliation (more of the latter, I'm afraid) during the two-month season. Part of that is due to the constant motion and many points volleyball demands. But that mix of highs and lows, joy and sorrow, is why we love sports, even old-timers fidgeting on bleachers designed to test even the strongest spines and most cushioned buttocks. 

We get drawn in over time, sometimes without wishing to be. We see fellow humans trying to do something really hard, often failing and sometimes succeeding. We don't even need to fully understand the rules -- I never did figure out the bizarre substitution rules for volleyball which seemed to force some players to wait for the floor official to wave a player onto the court while others simply ran in and replaced someone. It was like some intricate dance and the Arapahoe coach choreographed things to the point that nearly everyone on the 12-player team participated in each set. The team remained mediocre despite these intricacies.

There were major characters, of course, such as the 6'3" junior who sparked gasps with her occasional thunderous kills, but they were all compelling characters, even the minor characters who appeared only to serve before returning to the bench. And compelling characters are the heart of great stories.

That's why I am constantly urging young journalists to spend some time observing practices and games and finding ways to share the stories of school teams. My nudges don't seem to be making much headway, if the papers and websites I judge are any indication. 

But sports are still the most fertile area for writers wanting to tell stories.

Biden can't get a break from the media

I read a column this morning that argues convincingly that President Biden has been a very effective chief executive, combining support for economic progress with international leadership, all while avoiding dominating the news cycle and embarrassing the world.

Yes, he's old... seven years older than me, so that gives me some credibility in terms of making this obvious point. Yes, he moves a bit stiffly, reportedly due to some arthritis. Yes, he sometimes struggles to speak as clearly and forcefully as we like in our professional actors.

But he somehow has managed to make trips to two war zones this year -- Ukraine and Israel -- and delivered a strong speech to America regarding the importance of supporting those two allies against the forces of authoritarianism. The economy is objectively doing quite well after the pandemic, better than any other major nation in the world. 

Our fractured media is so ineffective, however, that most Americans believe the economy is tanking (and this despite their own circumstances). Many of our fellow citizens seem fine with abandoning Ukraine to the Russian invasion. And some of our more wacko left-wingers are outraged that Biden urges us to side with those darn Jews.

The news media is obsessed with competition and comparisons and consistently errs in its reporting by adopting "false equivalencies" that obscure the fact that we have a major political party that has not clear ideas other than to recreate some mythical Golden Age, mostly dominated by Angry White People. 

I can understand how Fox News and even more right wing platforms are fine with the false equivalencies since without them they would have no arguments at all. But what about all the supposedly mainstream media that continue to focus on wins and losses and (always, always) on death and destruction and general bad news?

The mainstream media is now trusted by less than 25 percent of Americans, and it was closer to 50 percent just a few years ago. We can blame Elon Musk -- God knows he's an idiot who we mistakenly hail as a genius -- and we can blame social media. Yes, it's horrible.

But when the latest massacre (this time in Maine) doesn't even warrant a response from our legislators beyond "we need more mental health," well, isn't it time to call the dysfunctional Republican Party out as lacking ideas and even empathy? 

Sure, the most radical Democrats have many blind spots and certainly have no interest in finding solutions that the majority of Americans can agree with, but President Biden has continued to hold the party together and not allow those loud, somewhat crazed voices to dominate. 

I'd say we have a functional and progressive government in this country right now. 

A nation held hostage by the incompetent and criminal

It is tough to argue with a straight face that our fellow Americans should trust our leaders, our institutions, and our legal traditions when we are confronted with so many examples of ineptitude, moral cowardice, and outright malicious intent connected with those leaders and institutions.

It would be entirely understandable that a foreign rival/adversary would sense weakness on the part of the U.S. at this time. Nations do rise and fall and it is entirely possible that we are in some early stage of the fall of the American experiment. Why not push a little harder, if you are Russia or China or India or Hamas or... You get the idea.

It's difficult to wrap our heads around the idea that a handful of wackos in the House of Representatives can stifle a nation of 330 million from taking new actions, responding to threats, and supporting solutions to problems.

It's hard to fathom the arcane idea that one radical Senator can stall almost all progress on routine military leadership appointments, even in the midst of multiple foreign crises.

It's difficult to imagine why an entire political party has decided to abandon any pretense of actually governing. A few rabid partisans are OK with blowing the whole operation up, perhaps assuming that cooler heads will handle the fallout and that they can still get rich and famous on cable TV.

It's nearly impossible to imagine a disgraced narcissist having a decent chance to win re-election to the presidency, despite being under multiple indictments, despite having encouraged violence at the Capital, and despite a barrage of personal attacks on people that would shame a first-grader. 

But there we are. 

Occasionally I try to imagine what my grandchildren are thinking during all this insanity. Amazingly, the girls seem able to shrug it off and keep their "eyes on the prize." They work hard. They pay attention. They find joy in all sorts of things. The boys are likely too young to even pay much attention to the machinations of nutty adults. Good for them.

There really is only one solution to it all. Reasonable Americans need to vote to throw the obstructionists, the deluded, and the guilty out of office. Over and over. 

But the 2024 election seems so far away.

Violence and hate run rampant... just 'situation normal'

The sheer scale of human suffering today is overwhelming. Ukrainians continue to be bombed indiscriminately. Israelis were butchered last weekend and today the revenge bombing is killing and maiming Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Venezuelans endure unimaginable danger and hardship just for a chance to live in America, leading to moving scenes at the border.

Not much in the news about women and girls in Afghanistan -- I guess there is only so much bandwidth available for media coverage of all the pain -- but I assume it is ongoing. I dimly recall some mention this week about a civil war of some sort in Africa... but what else is new?

I don't mean to be flippant or unfeeling, but perhaps this unrelenting torrent of suffering among our fellow humans isn't really news at all, or at least is not unusual. Yes, massacres of innocent dancing young people in Israel by crazed fanatics grabs our attention due to the inhuman, unfocused killing.

But wait. Perhaps "inhuman" is not a very good word here. After all, one of the things that humans have been doing to one another for time immemorial is killing and maiming one another. We are quite good at it, despite the incessant killing being bad for our species.

I assume we will light the Compassion Candle this Sunday at St. Luke's for everyone suffering in Israel and Gaza, for all the good THAT will do. Our lead minister just urges everyone in the flock to "let love in, and let God in," and all will be well. 

It won't be well in any meaningful sense for the over 1 million Palestinians under age 18 currently being terrified by Israeli bombs and the warning to move immediately to the southern half of an already very small area. 

It won't be well for butchered Israeli children and grandmothers and so many other innocents, killed merely for being present in an area of the planet. I saw that many Arabs living in Israel were among the massacred. 

It turns out that most everyone looks like an enemy when we have lost our minds.

We are responding as a world leader should (oops), with a nonfunctional legislative branch unable to even pass a resolution in favor of, well, opposing hate. It's up to President Biden and the executive and military branches to actually do something tangible, though no one knows what would actually be helpful.

Our first act was to ship more weapons to the Middle East. Yes, of course. Let's contribute more kindling to the raging inferno. 

But how can we not want revenge? How can we not ache for butchered children?

Well, not for children stuck at our borders or children cowering in shelters in Gaza. 

Sunday we will hear messages of hope and peace and piously nod and sing and pray... which will do what, exactly? It turns out that religion is where we turn when we have been forced to give up on believing in humanity and kindness and rational behavior. 

Child poverty in our own wealthy country more than doubled this year, almost entirely due to our dysfunctional Congress deciding they wanted to make some political statement or other. Who knows? It's all about scoring points.

Humans COULD treat each other as that Jesus guy suggested: Love your neighbor as yourself.

But we don't really believe that, do we?

Too big to be governed?

I want to blame someone or something for the continued disconnect between reality and perception among Americans, but I'm beginning to wonder whether society has become too complex, too broad, and too, well, busy to get us all back to sharing a basic set of facts.

It may be that any nation that boasts 340 million residents spread across 50 states that each claim different approaches and mandates, all while interacting with a world of nearly 8 BILLION fellow humans, is simply impossible. 

Last night Kathleen and I drove over to Cherry Creek HS, which is the state's largest at 3,800 students, and marveled at the sprawling campus and byzantine parking and various gyms. The volleyball wasn't kind to Arapahoe, with was swept 3-0 and looked out of it. Anna did fine until she rolled her ankle or something in the final game. Fingers crossed that the injury is minor.

But it occurred to me that no one at CCHS could possibly know even a small percentage of fellow students or even faculty very well. The school is larger than some colleges.

There are studies that claim that the optimum size for a comprehensive high school is about 1,000. That provides a large enough student body to offer a wide range of activities and courses while also maintaining a community that can support and complement all involved.

Of course, smaller schools necessitate more principals (but maybe fewer assistants?), more coaches, more teachers (unless a system could be very carefully calculated to move personnel around). Each school needs a cafeteria and various specialized classrooms and performing areas.

So, the American drive for efficiency pushes many urban areas to opt for larger, centralized schools, along with larger bureaucracies to hold everything together. 

The American experiment was born in a relatively small geographic area with a much smaller population. In 1800, the U.S. had about 5.3 million residents in 16 states. Communication was difficult then (as opposed to now, where it is all too easy) and a relative handful of white males wielded all the political power. A majority of our current Supreme Court might term that period as "the good old days." 

In report after report in mainstream media, we find Americans feeling pretty good about their own economic outlook while bemoaning the wider economics of the country. We agonize over President Biden's age while appearing to accept the fact that his likely opponent is increasingly deranged (not to mention just three years younger). 

When was the last time you read a well-reported story that clearly laid out just how unhinged Trump's constant deluge of rhetoric is? 

Unemployment is at record lows, inflation is moderating, and we just saw 380,000 jobs added to the economy, double what was expected. But only 40 percent of Americans approve of the job Biden is doing leading the nation. An incredible amount of money is being pumped into states and counties that can only be described as "red," but most of the folks living in those areas either can't see it or won't see it.

A large study has concluded that Republican-led states are now shaving 3-5 years of life from their citizens due to policies on everything from tobacco to public health to Covid responses. But, of course, Joe Sixpack from Ohio is still alive and it is human nature to believe that the bad stuff happens to "them," not to him.

Like I say, it's a giant country and it may be pointless to try to pull together. 

As Seinfeld reminds us: "People. They're the worst."