No One Has Ever Won The Kentucky Derby On A Donkey

Play Ball!

In fifteen weeks from this Saturday, the crowds will hear the singing of, "My Old Kentucky Home" and a few minutes later, hear the track announcer say,"--- and they're off!" at the 144th running of the Kentucky Derby in Louisville, Kentucky.That first Saturday in May is like so much in life. Regardless of how you plan, Mother Nature may just have a different thought about how that day will go from year to year.

Last week, a young college professor that I know, wrote a blog post about how people don't ride horses any more. Now, true, this U Mass teacher does live in Boston and while Paul Revere may have ridden his horse to Concord yelling, "The British Are Coming", in Ft. Worth, they were getting ready for the month long Ft. Worth Stock Show and Rodeo. I missed the Western Parade because of the cold. An email from one of my editors wanted to know if I would cover the show for them and I had to decline. It was the second offer from them that I had to say no.  But that didn't dampen my spirits. I have a file folder of people I've come across that ride horses here in Dallas. Being  somewhat of a joker that I am, I  sent Pat the file of images. It wasn't long before I got a reply saying that, "well, I guess people still do ride horses after all." Pat is a link in a growing  number of Anthropologist that I have known, currently know and read regularly and joke with in bantering phrases.

Repartee.Wordplay.Good-humored.Jesting. But most of all, it ties me to an old college professor of mine who was pure English and was then and now in death is noted for his translations of Percy Bysshe Shelley. While teaching in the landmark Hallmarks of English education before coming to the states ever few years, Neville, would go back to London to his flat in the summer. He would continue to write to me filled with his banter and to this day, those days in his classes and the group discussions held in his apartment on the weekends, were spent listening to jazz recordings that he found so delightful as he sipped on  imported Spanish Cognac or Sherry, talking in detail about The Humanities. Neville was employed in our  English Department and the course that I paid to be in was his, The Humanities. Never in my wildest dream would I ever think that such a course would be so profound on my life. It all played out to Mother Nature's plan and I am most grateful and thankful to have had that experience to banter with a man who was so English, so common, so expert in his field. A lot of reading for a course for sure, but when one stops to think that the great leaders of the world all had that same experience, it wraps me in that cloak of knowledge that others do not have. Strongly influenced by Shelley's poems were people like Karl Marx, no less, Leo Tolstoy and Mahatma Gandhi.

Henry David Thoreau's Civil Disobedience was greatly influenced from Shelley's stand on non-violence  and to have in political protest to violence, no violence. Knowing that Shelley died young in 1822, his popularity is greater now that at the time of his death. Then, I look at the news headlines and I wonder where the Shelley's of today are. All I see is haters everywhere.

Perception Is Everything

Perception of U S Marine Corp

Pride

Traveling Corp.

Just when in life, you reach a point where you really don't care what people think, it becomes crystal clear how important perception really plays a part.This point was made  more clear this past week. The example came from the strangest of places with the strangest of  projects. Sometimes it is almost  better to fail than to be seen in the light of  being a "copy cat". There are some who are pulling their hair our by now because of that string of words "better to fail than to be seen". But, of course, they are the very people who miss so much because  common sense is not so common for their world. That doesn't make them ignorant or stupid, but the perception can put the focus in  a different light.

Example 1

There are some interesting people on Twitter. Some, I even follow. A couple of those scholars  sound almost human. Then, I am reminded of an old neighbor who was listed in the "Who's Who" of American Anthropology and was professor in the Anthropology Department of a major University, yet he would come home at night and cut his front lawn by a push-real mower with a taped on flashlight to light his way in the dark of night. The perception was rather odd to many of  his neighbors. The reality of it all was that his brain was working overtime and later on in the semester his published papers would rock the world of Anthropology from those flashlight cuttings. The perception was not the reality and looking back today, I was literally watching thought being generated,then store itself in his grey matter until he released it onto paper.

There is this one account that gives me indulgence because he reminds me of the former neighbor. His perception of me is that I'm odd, I would believe, but as is human nature, that is my perception of how he views me. He is moving up the ladder of academia at another major university. He's blended teaching, family life, writing scholarly articles that are published with being trapped in a world that he thinks he has control over from an academic standpoint to the reality that he too, has reached that point in life with  waining connect to being young and energized with ambition and hopes for the future. My hope is that I live long enough to have him report that he cut his lawn with a flash light taped to the handle of his lawn mower. That's my perception.

Example 2

Never would I draw to conclusion or formed the perception that when Dallas developed, planned and built the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge that the city of Irving would try to copy that with a major bridge building project. People went nuts when Dallas built a $130 million plus cable-stayed bridge over the Trinity River, but really now, Irving building one to identify the City of Irving is a bit much. Hello! You have the Famous Mustangs of Los Colinas, don't you see. You created  Los Colinas. You have Lake Carolyn. You have the canals.You have the gondola boats. You now have your convention center. You have the Orange Line, the Monorail. You have The Four Seasons  at TPC Cottonwood. Carpenter Ranch has been good for Irving.

The perception is that  this blog does not  favor  Irving. This blog has reported several times in the past that Irving is high on my list of places dear to my heart. Across the Carpenter Freeway from Irving's Convention Center at Los Colinas,  is the world headquarters of Exxon Mobil Oil, that is  nestled fairly deep in the woods of their corporate estate and compound.The reality is that this blog  will always be grateful to Exxon Mobil Oil for what they have done in the past, personally.

So, when things seem one way, looking the other way in the opposite direction will usually reset you humanity compass so that you can make adjustments that will align you more to a perception that is in refined focus. Of course, that is only a perception.