July 5, 2019 Issue, Page 4 of 12

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Serving Western Oklahoma Since 1901 My favorite holiday is ‘Trying his best to comfort her, he realized he had no answer. This man is atop level executive in a world-wide Glynda Lomax is a Chris- door of someone who acted company with offices and Photo source: Metro Creative. tian author and podcaster foolishly? It may help you to assistants on both sides of the ocean who is accustomed who resides in the Ozark know that others who have to being able to affect and Mountains of Northern Arkan- made right choices have also change even near impos- By Don Munsch sas with her two very bossy been ravaged and taken from, sible situations. Nothing is Editor dogs. She wrote her first About their carefully laid plans sent more important to him than Life... column in 2003 fora reeling. The dragon of change his children. Yet with all his What is your favorite holiday? newspaper in Dallas.She is showed up at their door as wealth, power and prestige, I would guess some people will choose July Fourth as their planning her next book. well. he could not do one thing help Glynda Lomax Some parts of our journey favorite holiday, as the day promises food, libations and his tiny daughter. fireworks. “Challenge is a dragon with through life are happy and Walking out of the room for ation we have been dealt as For yours truly, I would pick Thanksgiving as my slight a gift in its mouth... Tame the comfortable and other parts some fresh air a few minutes positively as we can, or to let favorite over Christmas. It’s a day to eat turkey, count bless- dragon and the gift is yours.” - may be steep, rocky and later, he walked down the itmake us bitter and remain Noela Evans fraught with peril. In times hallways of the hospital. As ings and watch some football. like these, rocky places we stuck in the past for the rest Does anyone ever pick Groundhog Day? Probably not. We he looked, he began to see of our lives. Some people really hate never expected can suddenly ‘small children who had lost don’t get that day off, unlike the other holidays listed above. change. The worst kind of crop up in our lives and leave their hair from chemotherapy We never question the good But what makes so many holidays appealing these days change is the kind we did not us facing a mountain unlike treatments, children covered things that come to us, but are the many sales people can find. choose and cannot control, anything we’ve ever known somehow we think we should in bandages from burns in At least that’s what companies want us to think. Sometimes the woes of our before. auto accidents and house not have to endure the bad or A duly Fourth circular online for a national retailer con- times ravage your life, take It is important to remember fires, tiny children with limbs the difficult. Maybe instead of tained the phrase “Red, White and BBQ.” Another retailer your possessions and leave that even the craggy parts missing. He saw parents with asking ourselves “Why me?” tries to encourage people into stores with the phrase “Red, you weary like they did so of our journeys have gifts to eyes full of despair, parents White and Blue Savings.” many during The Great Re- bring us. We cannot always when tragedy knocks on our A Yahoo clickbait story directed people to retailers of- cession. Sometimes someone change the road we are on who knew their children would never live normal lives, door, we really should be ask- fering “deals that will actually save you money” this July we love or depend on passes, and when we can’t, we must if indeed they got to live their ing “Why not me?” Fourth. Some of the retailers gave the online checkout code changing our life forever. somehow find the courage lives at all. with the sale offer, with one using the words BIGBANG30. Sometimes our health fails to face the hard places and Every day children are di- “Life moves on, whether we Surprisingly enough, none of the retailers used the code and we find we are unable to move past them. It is in the agnosed with devastating dis- act as cowards or heroes. Life “EXPLOSIVE DEALS” or “POP GOES THE SAVINGS.” do the activities we love. One steep and stony places that eases and people die untimely has no other discipline to im- Retailers use holidays to motivate people to visit their morning you wake up, and we learn there is beauty even deaths in accidents or by the pose, if we would but realize stores on a day when most people are off work, obviously. your whole life changes in in rocky times. When the go- hand of crime, from cancer it, than to accept life unques- the blink of an eye. In a way ing gets rough, if you cannot and many other causes. Inrecent years, though, there’s been some blowback about you never saw coming, like a change your path, you must ‘Spouses leave us though we tioningly. Everything we shut this, especially on Memorial Day, as some people - rightly, I truck coming out of nowhere. change the way you view the did all we could to make them our eyes to, everything we think - don’t think the day should be exploited for commer- You may find yourself ask- scenery, or you must change wanto stay. Children get into run away from, everything we cial gain. It should be primarily a day of reflection, not one in ing ‘Why Me?’ ‘Why now?’ yourself. trouble in spite of all we have deny, denigrate or despise, which people can get a “good deal” on a mattress or La-Z-boy Afriend recently told taught them. Bad things do serves to defeat us in the end. recliner. Why hasn't life played me the story of being at his happen to good people just What seems nasty, painful, ‘Thanksgiving now has many retailers giddy because so out the way you so carefully 5-year-old daughter's bedside as good things happen to bad evil, can become a source many people want to venture out on the evening of Turkey planned it? Why has change when she was diagnosed with ones and we cannot always of beauty, joy, and strength, Day so they can - retailer speak here again - “gobble up” big shown up at your door when diabetes. He still remembers Imow why. Perhaps we will sales and save money. The day ofgiving thanks has become you tried so hard to always his feeling of helplessness as never understand much of the iffaced with an open mind. every bit as commercial as Christmas. do the right thing, make he looked down into her soft injustice we have witnessed. Every moment is a golden one ‘The Fourth, though, is day to celebrate the country’s the right choice, when you blue eyes filling with tears But our choice remains the for him who has the vision to independence and personal freedoms, and thus one could lived so carefully? Shouldn’t and she whispered, ‘Daddy, same, and that is to move recognize it as such.” - Henry potentially see more use for shopping on this day, especially it have gone instead to the why did this happen to me?’ forward dealing with the situ- Miller to buy soda, hot dogs and briquettes. You gotta think the Founding Fathers would have been OK with people using this day to relax and scarf down some yummy food and Addressing teacher watch fireworks. But would Thomas Jefferson have wanted to people to seek out acar dealership on the Fourth? Especially for a new SUV that comes fully equipped, has a price that can’t be matched and if that car dealer can’t beat a deal, he’s just shortage “gonna give it to you?” ‘Maybe. The nation broke away from Great Britain partly over taxation without representation and, at some level I think, the freedom to get great deals at retailers. But the SUV part I am not sure about. Didn’t TJ drive a truck that had a hemi? Stillwater NewsPress, Okla. the material, they may know big part of Democratic presi- What if we turned our atten- children and they may be dential platforms, for more tion just to teachers, just to We need some new ap- perfectly fine educators. The than a handful of candidates see if it works? What if we Have a letter to proaches to address our problem is, there is no way has been free college, for could put students who work state’s shortage of quali- this is sustainable. everyone, or for a smaller to get into the teaching field, the editor? Email fied teachers. According to Those numbers could handful, student loan forgive- specifically, on a loan pro- a Tulsa World report, for improve, the Legislature ness. Many argue that isn’t gram that only requires pay- it to editor@ the 2017-2018 school year, Oklahoma public schools has raised teacher pay and classroom funding in the last very fair to those who came out of school debt free, and ment if the student didn’t stay on as a public school teacher ecdailynews.com added around 1,000 teachers two years. Only time will tell that may be the case, but what for a certain amount of time, through emergency license. ifit’s enough to counterbal- if we could tweakit a bit? depreciating with each year That seems like a lot. ance the teachers who leave It’s hard to imagine it’s they remain a public school or stop by 109 W. Firstly, many emergency- the profession or the young very easy to enter the work- teacher? It’s not impossible, certified teachers may be people who decide to try force saddled with student and it’s a lot more pragmatic Broadway, Elk City. perfectly capable of sculpting another state. loans for a job that doesn’t than free college for every- young minds. They may know What about incentives? A have a great starting salary. one.