By Joe Rector My son Dallas has a lot of his grandmother’s DNA flowing through his veins. For the second year, he’s put out pepper plants in five-gallon buckets (he doesn’t have much yard at his condo). He’s babied those plants, and they’ve yielded hundreds of banana and jalapeno peppers. Dallas has concocted his own […]
By Joe Rector The image stunned me: a mile and a half line of traffic in the Dallas area. The vehicles were lined up down the road from a large parking lot. There, boxes of food were being distributed to people who were in need. All races, all ages, and all social classes were represented. […]
By Joe Rector If you are one of the many folks who travel Karns Valley Road and Emory Road, get ready for more headaches. Your drive time will grow; your frustration level will increase; and your chances of being involved in an accident will multiply. A tract of land located at the intersection of Henderson […]
By Joe Rector I’m guilty. I plead that to many things in my life. Some aren’t especially attractive, while others are just a bit goofy. Still, all of this time spent avoiding most people and places in order to stay healthy has found me looking a bit deeper at who I am. If confession is […]
By Joe Rector I saw the obituary for a high school friend in the paper. It made me sad and just a bit shocked. The reminder that people my age and I are reaching the last few years of our lives also delivered a jolt. Younger folks are tired of hearing about “Baby Boomers,” and […]
By Joe Rector Amy bought me one of those micro-shavers that trims and shaves and cuts. It’s a neat little gadget that gives me a break from the shaving ritual that I’ve followed for decades. This new razor would be nicer if I used it to cut the scraggily parts of a beard, but my […]
By Joe Rector Americans baffle me. We never seem to stay on an even keel. One minute we are excited about the wonderful things in this life; the next, we are bemoaning the terrible fates that have befallen us. What we might do before the whining begins is realize that most of our problems are […]
By Joe Rector This coronavirus has kicked us for half a year, and most folks are losing patience with it and the restraints that it demands of us. Some people handle things better than the rest of us. I feel for young people the most. They’ve lost graduations, birthday parties, and sports. We who are […]
By Joe Rector The fuel to many problems right now is anger. It is the stuff that stokes the flames of unrest. I don’t blame folks for being furious for the mistreatment of individuals in the hands of some police officers. They have grievances that need to be aired. Right now, however, the temperatures of […]
By Joe Rector Enough! It’s that simple. This country already has plenty of problems without piling on more and more. Now, this might not make anyone happy, but the truth is that all sides share some of the blame for the mess we are in. It is also true that the extremes on the left […]
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