The Evenin' Shadders

Dear Daniel: By the time you read this, your graduation ceremony will be over. You and 500 or so of your friends have reached the first big intersection on that road we call life. Congratulations. As I watched you sit at the Ford Center last Thursday, I couldn’t help but remember your childhood. Granted, you are not my son, but instead, you’re the son of my closest friend. And, therefore, you are family. You were only 3 months old with I met your father. We both went to work for the Oklahoma Legislature and both found ourselves stuffed into this tiny office with no windows and very little space. Your dad had been there, maybe two days, at the most, when he told me he was going to be taking several weeks off. I wasn’t too happy about that. I’d started a week before he did and I didn’t understand why he was so special. I remember cussing him and pretty much acting like schmuck. Later, when he returned, he told me how his newborn son had to have heart surgery and that’s why he wasn’t at ...

It’s dark. The neon reflects in the rain-slicked streets. Around me, a million cars seek a path known only to them. Inside my car it’s quiet. The steady hum of the tires on the pavement and the slow, fluid sounds of Dave Brubeck’s Take Five fill the void. Somehow, for me, that piece of music sounds like rain. The saxaphone splashes notes against the windshield like so many raindrops. The sun has long since faded for the day. For the week, maybe. Above me, the sky hangs low, moist and soft and gray. Colors are more vivid — the red dirt, so prevelent here in Oklahoma, has been washed way. Brubeck continues. In my mind I see a single man, wrapped in a dark overcoat, moving quietly through the rain-soaked street. I change lanes and merge smoothly toward the downtown exit. Near Broadway and 23th Street the aroma of newly baked bread hangs heavy in the moist air. It swirls and blends with the smell of my large coffee, and takes my mind places on this late, wet night that I haven’t visited in...

It wasn’t that long ago that Texas Gov. Rick Perry stood in front of a crowd of his fellow conservatives and pontificated about how bad the federal government was. In fact, it was so bad Perry said, that Texas should succeed from the Union. “But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that,” the governor said. “But Texas is a very unique place, and we’re a pretty independent lot to boot.” The governor complained and whined about Texas’ share of federal stimulus money. And, as a show of Texas independence, Perry rejected $550 million in federal economic stimulus money slated to help Texas’ unemployment trust fund. Perry said Texas didn’t want the money because it would come with strings attached that would leave Texas paying the bill once the federal money ran out. Then he said he believes he could be at the center of a national movement which is coordinated and focused in its opposition to the actions of the federal...