It seems we have 450 television channels and somedays there’s nothing worth watching.
       I do enjoy some of the crime shows, especially the cold case crimes and OP (On Patrol) Live on Friday and Saturday nights.
        I also enjoy some of the oldies such as Gunsmoke, Bonanza, the Waltons and the Andy Griffith Show.
In later years, I enjoyed shows like Eight is Enough, Vegas, Incredible Hulk, Little House on the Prairie, CHiPs, Wonder Woman, Bionic Woman and Bionic Man with Lee Majors as Col. Steve Austin.
      There was Police Woman with Angie Dickinson and Stanford and Son, Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley, Brady Bunch, Dukes of Hazzard, Dallas, WKRP in Cincinnati, Fantasy Island, Three’s Company, Beverly Hillbillies, Happy Days, the Love Boat, Columbo, the Equalizer from the 1980s and more.
        Growing up, we had four channels to watch – NBC, CBS, ABC and PBS – on the family 19-inch Zenith black and white console. It included modern futures of the time such as a dial to change the channels and push button to switch the television on and off.
         It wasn’t until 1974 that I first got cable television.
        My Tulsa neighborhood was one of the first test markets for cable television in the city. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to be in junior high school and have cable television. I went from four stations to 32 just like that.
         It cost $5.45 per month and I was billed every two months.
         I used my paper route money to pay the bill.
         Nowadays, it costs 10 times or more a month for all the extras. It is ridiculous.
       And then there is the internet at $120 plus a month and cell phones. How much more can you spend to buy a cell phone? And it’s not just the phone, it’s all the fees to set up a new phone and then the taxes and service fees each month on the bill.
         I don’t know how people afford an apartment, utilities, a car payment, food and a cell phone.
         Anyway, I got to watching golf the other day.
        What better sport to watch on a cold winter day than a round of golf from some summer resort? There can be snow and ice storms, cold blasts, hurricanes and the such. Still, there is a summer paradise tucked away somewhere in the states where professional golf players can hit the greens.
        Some of those fellows are quite good. They might be able to hit the hole standing on their head. How many of you remember Arnold Palmer?
        The first time I tried my hand at playing real golf was in the early 1980s. A good friend of mine and I decided to try our hand at a 9-hole lighted all-night golf course in Tulsa.
         My friend had a set of old golf clubs and we tried our luck. If you call it that.
        I pulled a club out of the bag and proceeded to warm up. I was swinging away when I hit a divot of dirt and slapped this fellow in the head.
         I was apologizing profusely and as he cleaned the dirt away from his shirt.
         I was not only embarrassed, but scared he might take me out before the evening ended.
         I don’t remember my final score. It wasn’t good!
         I’m more keen to playing miniature golf.
        We had several mini golf courses in Tulsa. The most notable were two side-by-side mini courses at Bells Amusement Park at the Tulsa Fairgrounds.
         A visit to Bells on a weekend night was the best.
     There was Zingo, a big wooden roller coaster, built in the mid-to-late 60s. Other rides included the Phantasmagoria, Scrambler, Himalaya, Ferris Wheel, Tilt-a-Whirl, White Lightnin’ (Log Flume) and the mini golf courses.
       My last time playing mini golf was a few years ago at the Lake of the Ozarks with the family. I was leading the pack into the 18th hole, only to miss the mark and finish in fourth or fifth place.
       I also enjoyed playing pinball. There was a pool hall across the street from my boyhood home in Tulsa. I enjoyed spending time with my Uncle Ron playing pinball. He was quite good.
       Back in the day, I used to enjoy bowling. My Aunt Alice, my mom’s younger sister, taught me the sport at age 12.
        I participated in several leagues through the years, giving it up in the mid-1980s. I joined a league at Star Lanes in Montezuma in August 2015.
       I bowled there for one year, then moved to Grinnell for one year. I finally gave up the ghost and the sport, at least for now.
         I don’t hunt, but I do enjoy fishing.
         I haven’t been fishing in years. I have a nice rod and reel and I’m sure before long, the fish will be biting.
         Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

        I believe it was January 1988.
     I was working for the Newspaper Printing Corporation (NPC) in Tulsa. NPC was the joint operating company who printed and distributed the two Tulsa newspapers at the time.
     A family member had died in the Bootheel of Missouri and my mom asked if I would take her to the funeral in New Madrid, some 425 miles away.
       New Madrid, which runs along the Mississippi River, is the name given to the New Madrid Fault Line and where the Mississippi River ran backwards in the 1811-12 earthquakes.
       We left Tulsa that evening and drove east on the Interstate, taking the MM Junction shortcut on the west side of Springfield, Mo. where we connected with Highway 60 east.
       We stopped for the evening near Van Buren, Mo., where my mom graduated from high school in 1955. We enjoyed breakfast at the New Madrid Café the next morning and my mom ran into a classmate from back in the day.
       We made the 100 mile trek to New Madrid and attended the funeral. I didn’t care too much for funerals, so I stayed in the car while my mom attended the service.
        My mom was born in New Madrid in October 1936, and lived in various shacks in that part of the state.
     Her grandparents on both sides of the family, the Jacksons and Hortons, had migrated to southeast Missouri from northwest Alabama.
     The Hortons where the first to arrive in 1924 after my great-grandfather had been caught making moonshine in Alabama.
          The Jackson side of the family arrived from Alabama in 1932.
       The families knew each other. My grandparents were married on Oct. 30, 1932 in the New Madrid County Courthouse.
        I’ve visited that neck of the woods many times as a youngster.
       We always took a family vacation in August and many times a stop in New Madrid was on the agenda. My mom loved to visit her old stomping grounds and share her many stories of growing up there.
        She had many photos from those days along with many stories she shared.
      Some years before that trip in 1988, we were packing up for a trip to the Bootheel. We left way too late, which was a usual trait in our family.
       My uncle Leon, my mom’s younger brother, had a summer cabin east of Van Buren and we stopped there for supper. It was dark and my dad was ready to stay the night. Mom said we were going on to the Bootheel. We probably should have stayed, but I wasn’t in charge.
      We arrived in Bertrand, Mo., on Highway 60 and stopped at the Raymond and Margaret Morrow house. Margaret was my mom’s cousin. We slept in our camper the rest of the evening. The next morning we got up and enjoyed a huge breakfast. 
      The Marrow family were big time farmers in that part of the country. Nearby their home was Wolfe Island, which is owned by Kentucky but assessable from Missouri.
      The Marrow’s farmed the nearly 10,000 acre island and had much of their farming equipment in sheds on the island.
      At one time there was an old river house on stilts on the island. A flood in the 1970s washed the house down the river.
      I remember one year riding with my dad and Raymond Morrow. We stopped at a hardware store near Charleston and picked up hoes for the workers they hired to clean weeds.
      The next day, I went to the island and hoed a few rows of soybeans. I got paid $10 by check from the Marrow’s oldest son.
       My mom’s aunt and mother of Margaret was remarried and her husband had a tackle box he wanted to sell me. He offered to cash my check if I would buy the tacklebox. At the urging of my dad, I bought the tacklebox and still had $7 in change.
     It was in the Bootheel in 1948 that my mom got sick. My grandparents didn’t have vehicle, so my grandfather would make a bed on the plow and pull her to town with tractor.
     The doctor was ready to carry her to the Mayo Clinic, but wanted to try one more medicine. My grandparents said they didn’t have the money to travel to the clinic.
         The doctor gave my mom penicillin and it cured her.
         I remember hearing the stories of my mom and family taking bathes in a #7 wash tub and how they took care of their business in an outhouse.
        It had to be a hard life. My mom often talked about picking cotton on hot summer days. Each kid was required to pick 100 pounds of cotton by hand each day. 
         Their reward was a cold Pepsi on the Fourth of July.
       My grandmother was a long-time cook in schools and nursing homes and my grandfather worked as a sharecropper.
        In 1951, my mom’s family moved from New Madrid to Van Buren. She shared a story once of an ice storm hitting New Madrid. Not wanting to break her perfect school record, my grandfather carried her to school in his old pickup and when they arrived, school had been closed.
       After my mom moved to Tulsa following graduation, my grandparents along with a sister and brother, followed in the early 1960s, moving to Oklahoma.
        Another time on a trip to the Bootheel, we decided to stop for the evening at a campground. We pulled in and my dad told my mom that we were not cooking supper on the Coleman stove. Instead, we stopped a small restaurant where I enjoyed a large pizza. I ate the whole thing.
       In the late 90s, we enjoyed many Jackson family reunions in Van Buren on the Current River, a popular floating destination in the area. And around that same time, the Horton side of the family started gathering every other Labor Day for a reunion.
       Those reunions and family get-to-gathers have since gone to the wayside, as much of the family has since passed.
        But the memories of hearing my mom tell stories of the hard and good times will live on forever.
        Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

​        I’ve had the privilege of interviewing gubernatorial and political candidates through the years. And some years ago, I interviewed the now late Fred Thompson, who was running in the 2008 election for President. He made a campaign stop in Montezuma shortly after Christmas 2007 and at the Republican newspaper office where I did the interview.
        A stately and polite man, he took a seat at the desk across from me where he placed his 10-gallon cowboy hat and crossed his legs.
      The Republican office quickly filled up with Thompson campaign folks. It was so quiet during the interview, that I could hear a pin drop. 
        But my best interviews have been talking with every day Iowans who are following their dreams, sharing their lives and their talents.
         Take for instance, Brian Abeling of West Des Moines.
        Known as the man behind the camera on his Facebook page, Iowa Road Trip, Abeling has been traveling around the state for years photographing state parks, attending parades and festivals, promoting small town businesses and taking photos of unusual and interesting features in Iowa.
      Abeling, 54, who grew up in Monticello, became interested in photography in the ninth grade. He didn’t do much with the art in the early going.
       After attending and graduating from UNI, Abeling landed in Peoria, Ill.
      Seven years later, he returned to West Des Moines, where he works as the director of technology at West Des Moines Schools.
         He is married with two grown kids.
       Abeling renewed his interest in photography and in the early years, took photos on family vacations.
       It was in 2013, that Abeling realized he didn’t have to wait for a vacation to take great photos.
       “I had always wanted to take photos around Iowa,” he said. “I started shooting more photos that were close to home.”
          He posted his work on his own personal Facebook page.
          In 2018, he started Iowa Road Trip.
        Abeling has visited all 99 Iowa counties, but not all the cities and towns in each county. When asked how towns he has visited, Abeling said he doesn’t know.
         His Facebook page features about 10-12 places a day.
         “I’m not at all those places every day,” he said. “It’s places that I have already visited.”
      He takes an average of 1 – 2 photo trips a month and covers 7,000 miles a year for photography.
        He started with a Pentex 1000 camera in the early days. Today, his cameras of choice are Canon, Sony and a drone.
       His trips are labeled under three different categories. Wife trips, mother-in-law trips and solo trips.
       The wife trips include traveling to places where his wife can shop and dine. The mother-in-law trips are catered toward her interests. This includes visiting many of the beautiful Iowa churches, especially those in small towns.
        And then there are the solo trips. It’s just him and his camera.
        “I’m up for a road trip anytime,” he said.
       In some cases, he might photograph 20 – 30 things in one town. It just depends on what is available.
       Those who follow Abeling often recognize him in the communities he visits. For instance, he was recently in Orange City in northwest Iowa covering a Dutch festival.
      “My first time being in Orange City, people recognized me from Iowa Roadtrip and wanted to talk,” he recalled.
        A few years ago, he met a couple at a state park and they started visiting. He learned that they were at the state park after seeing his photos on Facebook.
         “I have been in places where people have told me that the reason that they are there is because of Iowa Roadtrip,” he said.
         With all the miles and time away from home, I asked Abeling how he funds the trips. He doesn’t get paid. Instead, he does freelance work and sells his photos to Iowa magazines such as “The Iowan” and “Our Iowa.”
        He also runs a stock photo business and sells his work to tourist organization and similar companies.
       Abeling is branching out more these days promoting small businesses and restaurants  and telling their stories.
   He encourages owners of small business or destinations, to email him at [email protected] and share about what their business or destination has to offer.
          “I work with the owners to help promote their businesses,” he said.
         Sounds like a win-win for Iowans and Iowa businesses, restaurants and tourism. And it all started with a love of photography.
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

         I just finished reading the book, “God Stories” by Courtney Dailey.
        The book was a Christmas gift from my mother-in-law.
       Dailey, a Christian author from far eastern Tennessee, wrote the book about rebuilding the homes of 16 families and helping them cope after Hurricane Helena struck western North Carolina in September 2024.
        It all started after Dailey and her 9-year-old daughter went to visit their friend, Jerry, who lived in the damaged area. Seeing Jerry and his badly damaged home led Daily, her husband and church to reach out and help those hit by the storm.
        In her book, Daily shared about how God provided labor from around the country along with building supplies, appliances, campers for people to stay in while their homes were being repaired and newer vehicles to drive after the families lost theirs in the flooding.
         I enjoyed it so much that I read the 240-page book in three days. 
      I admit, it is the first book that I have read since reading my wife’s first novel, “The Auctioneer,” during Covid. And probably the fourth book that I’ve read in the last 10 or so years including “Mercy Shot” a political thriller by Grinnell native and North Liberty realtor Steve Sherman. 
        Prior to that, I’ve read a couple books about the Oklahoma Girl Scout murders, regarding the deaths of three young girls killed at Camp Scout in June 1977. I went to Boy Scout Camp just down the road from where the girls were murdered.
        The case was never solved and remains that way to this date.
         I’ll share more on that topic in a future column.
         Now that I am retired, my plans are to read more books.
         First on the agenda is reading my wife’s other four novels.
         I admit, I’ve been a bit lackadaisical in my reading efforts.
        Another Iowa author that I’m interested in reading her work is Ruth Suckow, author of at least a dozen books, including “Country People” her first book published in 1924.
        I first learned of Suckow in the fall of 2024 when writing a story about Drake Community Library Assistant, Veronica Ruse, who at the time worked in Local History Archives at Drake, a position she held since March 2022.
        I became interested in Suckow after learning that Ruse garnered the top prize of a $1,000 scholarship for an essay she wrote entitled “August and Emma Kaetterhenry: A Farm Marriage Examined” based on the characters in Suckow’s first novel, “Country People.”
      The novel “Country People,” follows the Kaetterhenrys, a German-American clan that works to build both a farm and family, while navigating the tensions between individual desires and community expectations.
          It just happens that Suckow has a deep connection with Grinnell. 
        Suckow was born in 1892 in Hawarden, a small town in Sioux County on the Big Sioux River in far northwestern Iowa, where at the time her father was the pastor of the Congregational Church.
       After leaving Hawarden in early 1898, the Suckow family lived in a number of towns in northern Iowa before her father landed a position at Grinnell College in 1907.
      Suckow graduated from Grinnell High School in 1910, and entered college that fall at Grinnell College.
         Suckow left Grinnell College early to study at the Curry School of Expression in Boston 
From 1913 to 1915. Her novel, “The Odyssey of a Nice Girl” published in 1925 reflects that experience. She left Boston to join her mother and sister who were living in Colorado for health reasons and enrolled at the University of Denver. She earned a B.A. in 1917 and an M.A. in English in 1918.
     Outside of “Country People,” and “The Odyssey of a Nice Girl,” Suckow’s other titles include “Iowa Interiors,” published in 1926, “The Bonney Family,” published in 1928, “Cora,” published in 1929, “The Kramer Girls,” published in 1930, “Children and Older People,” published in 1931, “The Folks,” published in 1934, “Carry-Over,” published in 1936, “New Home,” published in 1936, “A Memoir,” published in 1952, “Some Others and Myself,” published in 1952, and “The John Wood Case,” published in 1959.
      The Ruth Suckow Memorial Association, founded in 1966, is located in Earlville, Iowa where she and husband, Fenner Nunn, lived for a time. The RSMA sponsors the essay contest that Ruse won.
         Suckow died on Jan. 23, 1960.
        There is so much more about Suckow and her contributions to the literary world that is worth mentioning, but time and space limits it in this column.
        The important note is that reading can be fun, especially if it about subjects you enjoy. I’m somewhat fascinated with stories that take place around the early part of 1900s, especially about the Amish and farming with steam engines during the early days.
        But first, I need to dig into my wife’s novels and reread the first one followed by the other four.
         My advice this week is to turn off the daily news and pick up a book.
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

         I’ve met a lot of characters in my life. One of them that comes to mind is Vernon Mack “Booger” Ray. He was a beloved Oklahoma local known as the last of the pioneers for traveling the countryside in his covered wagon. What makes Booger Ray unique is that he appeared on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in 1987 and shared some of his rustic adventures, including a story about being chased by a mountain lion. A few years before that, he had been featured on a show called Real People which was a weekly prime time news magazine that profiled funny human-interest stories instead of featuring celebrities. 
          Booger Ray spent a lot of time in Oklahoma but also traveled to various other states in his handmade wagon that featured an iron cook stove and feather bed.
          Earlier in his life, Booger Ray had been a bull rider and that was where he had earned his nickname.
         It was sometime in 1988, and I heard that Booger Ray was going to be camping out at Mohawk Park in Tulsa. Mohawk Park is on the north side of Tulsa and is home to one of Tulsa’s two water treatment plants and the zoo.
          I hadn’t been dabbling in photography for too long and thought this might make a good opportunity to capture a unique Oklahoma character. I drove my Chevrolet Caviler up to the park and found Booger Ray’s camp site. We visited for a while and I asked if I could take some photos. He welcomed me to do so.
        He was a crusty fellow with a white beard and was wearing a cowboy hat, a pair of bib overalls with a red bandana around his neck. I took a few pictures, then told him I was going to run up to the local convenience store to get something to drink. He asked if he could ride along. I told him sure and watched as he strapped on his six-shooters before climbing in the car.
        It wasn’t until I was back in the car sitting in the parking lot of the convenience store, sipping on a Pepsi and waiting for him to come out, that it dawned on me that I’d just given a stranger with guns a ride to a gas station. As it took him a while to come out, I started to wonder if I had just made a huge mistake. But before long, he came out with a six-pack of beer. As he climbed in, he mentioned that the clerk had wanted to look at his guns but said he told him he didn’t have time for that as someone was waiting for him.
         We chatted as we drove back to the campsite. I took a few more pictures of Booger Ray, his mules, mutt and campsite. He gave me a postcard with his picture and signed it “Booger Ray”. Then we parted ways. I still have that postcard to this day.
          At the time the Tulsa Tribune, one of two daily papers in my hometown, was featuring an amateur photo contest known as KINSA. It referred to Kodak International Newspaper Snapshot Awards. It was a large international amateur photography competition running for decades with local newspaper involvement. I entered a photo I had taken of Booger Ray and won second place in the fourth week of the six-week contest. I received a certificate for my winning photo. 
           That was the first award I had ever won with my photography. I have always cherished that award and took great pride in that. 
          Of course, I’ve gone on to take thousands of pictures since my encounter with Booger Ray. I’ve met many characters along the way and have enjoyed meeting them all. But my memories with my Oklahoma friend, Booger Ray, hold a special place in my heart.
           Booger Ray died in January 1999 after celebrating his 85th birthday.
          Life gets busy. Make sure you take the time to meet new people, listen to their stories, and enjoy time with family and friends. 
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day and that making memories is one of the things that makes life so special.