Category Archives: Columns

Column: Friendship Trumps All

by Woody

My new memoir WOODEN & ME is also available here at Amazon

*   *   *  

Friendship Trumps Time and Separation

Tennessee Williams was spot-on when he observed, “Time doesn’t take away from friendship, nor does separation.”

Rarely has this been more clear personally than earlier this week when I met up with a boyhood friend I had not seen in a dozen years, if not more. Before that, it had been nearly as long again between reunions.

Jimmy and me: a poor picture of a rich friendship!

Jimmy and me: a poor picture of a rich friendship!

Prior to these long lapses, however, during our “Wonder Years,” Jimmy and I were thick as thieves, or scamps, or Tom and Huck. He was, in fact, my first friend upon moving to Ventura from Ohio at age 12.

Jimmy, four months my junior, wasn’t my friend so much as my “cousin” of which I have not a single biological one. Had he lived in Ventura, or I in Pasadena, we would have been “brothers.”

We first met because Jimmy’s aunt and uncle were my godparents. Each summer he stayed two weeks at their Solimar beach home and upon arriving here in 1972 I joined him. It became a yearly rendezvous through our teens.

Those beach days and nights were boyhood bliss. We stayed up late shooting pool and watching TV, slept in long, then spent the remaining sunlight in the waves and exploring tide pools, looking for seashells and ocean glass, playing basketball and talking about girls.

Too, I would annually stay a week with Jimmy and his mom – his father died when Jimmy was 4 and his only sibling, a sister, was 10 years older and already out of the house – in Pasadena. Summer at the beach is an idyllic playground that is hard to equal, but these vacations came close.

Jimmy was a California beach boy straight from Central Casting, with a toothpaste-ad smile, longish platinum hair, and a tan the color of an old penny. But his most striking feature, it always seemed to me, was his laugh.

Even at age 12, his laugh sounded like it came from an old man with emphysema – imagine Billy Crystal doing an out-of-breath character in a Brooklyn deli. Better yet, recall the wonderful hearty snicker of Muttley, the Hanna-Barbera cartoon dog. That was Jimmy’s laugh and he used it readily.

Separation of 70 miles – Jimmy still lives near Pasadena – is no excuse for the years of severance we allowed to pass.

Our last time together was when we saw John Wooden give a talk at the historic Pasadena Civic Center. Jimmy and I shared many similarities growing up and near top of the list was our idolization of the Wizard of Westwood. Indeed, we both went to Coach Wooden’s summer basketball camp and memorized every block in the Pyramid of Success.

Too bad we neglected Wooden’s preaching to “make friendship a fine art” – at least with each other. Annually our Christmas cards echoed sentiments to rekindle our friendship in the New Year, but we kept failing to keep the promise.

Taking the “Initiative” – a block in Wooden’s Pyramid – Jimmy’s 2014 holiday card included wishes of “Peace, Love & Joy” and a specific date in January to meet. When I walked into Brendan’s Irish Pub & Restaurant in Agoura Hills – a midway drive for both of us – the sight of my old friend was a time machine making me young again.

Our 15-year separation might as well have been five minutes. We picked up as if we had just been in the middle of a conversation before one of us left to go to the bathroom – the latter happening a number of times on this evening, causing Jimmy to say, “I guess we are in our fifties and not teenagers anymore.”

An anticipated hour visit lasted nearly four as we reminisced and caught up on wives and kids, work and play, and raised our glasses to the shared loved ones we have lost – his cousin and my second “sister”; his aunt and my godmother; his mom and my mom.

Bidding goodbye, Jimmy and I made plans for another hello very soon, and these words of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow came to mind: “Ah, how good it feels! The hand of an old friend.”

And the hug and the Muttley laugh, too.

*  *  *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden-&-Me-cover-mock-upCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

 

Column: An Unsalty Newsroom?

by Woody

My new memoir WOODEN & ME is also available here at Amazon

*   *   *  

A Newsroom That Isn’t A Little Salty?

Journalism and free speech are under attack, but I am not talking about cartoonists and Charlie Hebdo.

Earlier this week, York (Pa.) Newspaper Company publisher Sara Glines sent a memo to her troops at the York Daily Record, Lebanon Daily News, Public Opinion News, and Evening Sun requesting they not only use spell-check on their print copy but swear-check on their verbal language. It read in part:

1swear“I’ve heard some troubling conversations recently, so I want to remind all employees that cursing is not appropriate in the work environment. … I know that newspapers have had a salty history and culture. And I know that we all will slip from time to time. Still, I believe we can express ourselves adequately without the use of profanity. Let’s clean up our language and make this a workplace that anyone can feel comfortable in.”

This would seem admirable except for one small thing – we are talking about newsrooms! Might as well try to rid a football locker room, foxhole or Chris Rock of salty language. Good luck, and besides, why?

Glines didn’t stop at nixing the high sodium content in the newsroom air. She followed up the punch to the potty mouth with a second to the stomach via another memo a day later:

“Happy 2015 everyone! If your new year resolution is to eat healthy, we’re here to help. Our Healthy Vending machines will be installed on Thursday! No more Mountain Dew, no more Snickers bars. But there will be plenty of tasty treats. … And an added bonus, the new machines will accept credit cards, so you can snack without borrowing cash from your colleagues.”

Is she salty-word serious? This smells of entrapment because the surest way to make journalists swear, next to taking away half the word count they were promised for a story, is taking away their junk food.

Normally the posted comments under an on-line story aren’t worth the electrons used to illuminate them on-screen, but in this case the responses are as nearly as fun as being in a newsroom near deadline. Here’s a sampling:

*

“No cussing, OR snickers bars? This. Must. Not. Stand. #JeSuisYorkPA”

*

“I don’t see this as a workplace that I would ‘feel comfortable in.’ ”

*

“How the hell are people supposed to work under these conditions?”

*

“We need to send these people some (salty word) Snickers bars and (four salty words) Mountain Dew RIGHT NOW.”

*

“It’s the dawn of a golden age in that newsroom for reporters with kids selling candy bars.”

*

“You’ve (salty word) got to be (salty word) me. Not about the swearing – about the notion that York Daily Record employees are paid well enough to have credit cards.”

*

“No cursing, no junk food, AND no bumming change from coworkers? Has she ever worked in a newsroom before?”

*

“Does this mean we have to surrender the fifth of Old Granddad in our bottom desk drawer? (Salty word) I mean – darn – journalism really is becoming just like any other business: boring, bland, and bound to go under. Murrow and The Boys are rolling in their graves.”

*

“Hell. On. Earth. Or Pennsylvania.”

*

“The place sounds like a living heck.”

*

“I’ll give up my Snickers when you pry it from my cold, dead hands. Don’t take away my right to bear bars.”

*

“(Three salty words)! Another publisher who probably gets her news tips at the hair salon on Thursdays and tells the M.E. (Managing Editor): ‘It’s all anybody is talking about.’ ”

*

“Once they installed carpeting in the newsroom, it was downhill from there.”

*

“Try as I might, I just can’t imagine myself saying aloud in any of the newsrooms where I toiled: ‘Gosh darn it, that silly ol’ mayor isn’t calling me back and I need to file this story right doggone now. Dag nab it!’ ”

*

“Paging George Carlin.”

*

            In closing, let me page the ol’ newspaperman Mark Twain, who said: “Profanity is more necessary to me than is immunity from colds” and “When angry count four; when very angry, swear.”

*  *  *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden-&-Me-cover-mock-upCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

 

Column: Off Court He’s Still Magical

by Woody

My new memoir WOODEN & ME is also available here at Amazon

*   *   *  

Backboard to Boardroom, He’s Magic

It was the littlest of things, yet it remains an indelible memory more than a quarter century later. A small gesture of gracefulness telling a bigger story.

I was in the Los Angeles Lakers’ locker room as a rookie writer. It was after the game and reporters were boxing one another out around Magic Johnson’s locker stall like players battling for rebound position.

My kids Dallas and Greg enjoying a "Magic" moment at Cal Lutheran College two decades ago.

My kids Dallas and Greg enjoying a “Magic” moment at Cal Lutheran College two decades ago.

As the scrum of scribes and TV cameras thinned, I moved forward and finally asked a question to which Magic prefaced his answer: “Well, Woody… ”

Understand, I was not a familiar beat writer. Rather, this was my first time covering a Lakers game. But Magic had the grace to slyly spy the name on my media credential and made me feel welcomed.

Truth is, Magic made every media member feel welcomed – and made our working lives much easier.

Unlike Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who would escape to the showers without talking, or Shaq O’Neal, who seemed to delight in mumbling so we couldn’t hear what he was saying, Magic would sit at his locker and thoughtfully answer each and every question until the very last reporter had what he or she needed.

I had the good fortune to interview Magic many more times during the final few years of his playing career and also enjoyed a couple lengthy one-on-one conversations with him at his youth basketball camps at Cal Lutheran University after he retired. Every encounter was a pleasure.

For good reason when people ask me who my favorite person to interview has been, the first name I mention after John Wooden is Magic Johnson.

So when the basketball legend-turned-mogul entrepreneur was a guest speaker not long ago as part of UC Santa Barbara’s Arts & Lectures series at the Arlington Theatre, I had to be there.

I’m glad I was. I have seen many wonderful speakers on stage – including Maya Angelou, Malcolm Gladwell and the Dalai Lama – and Magic was second to none.

He also did something unique – he ignored the lectern, eschewed a chair, and in fact shunned the stage entirely. Instead, in theatric terms he “broke the fourth wall” and gave his nearly two-hour-long talk from the floor in front of the stage as well as intimately walking up and down the aisles.

After recounting how he and his strapped college dorm mates would clip coupons and pool their money to buy one large pizza and sodas to share, Magic thoughtfully walked to the back of the auditorium to address the UCSB students who suddenly went from being in the cheap seats to having a front-row view.

Along the way, Magic’s extra dose of “charisma” DNA was evident as he stopped and talked – and posed for snapshots – with a handful of audience members. An hour later – reminiscent of my long-ago locker room encounter – he addressed a couple of these same strangers by first name.

Magic has treated F. Scott Fitzgerald’s famous declaration, “There are no second acts in American lives,” like a backpedaling defender. He faked it out and scored. Impossibly, Magic has been as successful in the business boardroom as fast-breaking between the backboards.

A tweet-length post-NBA summary in 140 characters: Part owner of the Dodgers; owner of movie theaters, Starbucks, 24 Hour Fitness and Burger King franchises serving urban areas; philanthropist; HIV/AIDS activist.

Directing his wisdom directly to the “young people” in the Santa Barbara audience, Magic, now 55, encouraged them get an education, find mentors, and dream big.

“I was a student-athlete who went to class,” he shared.

“People helped me along the way so I need to help others.”

“I was poor, but I didn’t dream poor.”

Further advice for success in the business world, and life, included: “Respect people’s time”; “always be early”; and “over-deliver.”

“I want you to over-deliver to everybody; your parents; your professor,” Magic concluded. “That’s what we all have to do now. It’s not enough just to deliver anymore. You have to over-deliver.”

It was not lip service: Magic was scheduled to speak for an hour and a half but graciously over-delivered by 20 minutes.

Happily, some things never change.

*  *  *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden-&-Me-cover-mock-upCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Balls Bouncing In

by Woody

My new memoir WOODEN & ME is also available here at Amazon

Readers Deck Halls With Sports Balls

The day before my annual “Woody’s Holiday Ball Drive” kicked off, serial supporters Howard and Kathy Reich got things rolling – and bouncing – by donating two basketballs, two playground balls and two footballs.

Jim Cowan also enthusiastically jumped the gun by delivering ten basketballs – one each in honor of mentors who played important roles in his life – to the Ventura Boys & Girls Club. He happily noted: “They remembered me from past deliveries.”

BallDriveThe generosity has continued and to date, dear readers, you have donated 93 new sports balls to give local disadvantaged kids reason to smile.

There’s still time to drop off gift balls at any local youth organization – and please email word of your donation to woodywriter@gmail.com so it can be added to the final tally.

Here are some more generous givers to further inspire you:

Former Star – and all-star – sportswriter Jim Parker was as quick with the giving as he always was on a keyboard, and on Day 1 donated a basketball and soccer ball at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Ventura.

“I donated a football and basketball to the Montalvo Boys & Girls Club in honor of my brother, Michael Demeter, a great person and athlete who will be glad kids will be helped,” wrote Allison Johnson.

Draza Mrvichin dropped off two basketballs, four soccer balls and five baseballs to the Saticoy Boys & Girls Club.

Dorothy Jue Lee donated two official NFL footballs and one NBA basketball, noting: “As a retired elementary teacher I know how valuable balls are for children.” A week later, Dorothy decided she wanted to do more and gave another football and basketball to the Salvation Army, a recipient choice that honors the memory of Julius Gius who originated The Star’s annual Bellringer Campaign.

Kate Larsen, also a teacher, also donated to the Salvation Army, giving one football, one soccer ball and one basketball, noting: “It’s something to get the kids out of the house and off their electronic games.”

Another teacher, Kathy McAlpine, and her husband Ken, donated a soccer ball and Jane Montague dished out one basketball.

Glen Sittel donated one soccer ball, basketball and football and shared: “My son’s favorite ‘toy’ was always a ball and I think of the great times any parent can have with their children with something as simple as a ball. In addition, this gets the kids away from our electronic age and back to good old outdoor fun and exercise.”

Joann VanBuskirk, who donated two balls, similarly noted: “Sixty minutes a day is the new slogan to get kids outside and your ball drive will help a lot.”

Karyne and Tom Roweton gave one basketball, football and soccer ball.

Norma Zuber enlisted her sisterhood at Ventura’s Philanthropic Educational Organization Chapter FZ and donated four basketballs, four soccer balls and four regulation softballs. PEO’s motto is “Helping women reach for the stars” but it also helps girls – and boys – do so.

In addition to donating regulation-size basketball, football and soccer balls to Oxnard Fire Station No. 1, Sally and Tom Reeder added a fourth ball, explaining: “We lost a little boy this year – the grandson of our dear friends – who was 16 months old. In memory of Aiden we added one small soccer ball.”

Despite being hobbled by recent knee-replacement surgery, Audrey Rubin bought and delivered one soccer ball and football “in honor of my two bright, healthy (and athletic) darling grandkids.”

Linda and Jerry Mendelsohn did something even more important than donate 20 soccer balls to Westpark’s Police Activities League after-school sports program – they got their 4-year-old grandson involved in the philanthropy.

“I took Garrick shopping with me, explaining again why we do this – to help kids who might not get something for Christmas,” Jerry wrote. “He helped me pick out size 3, 4 and 5 soccer balls, load them into the shopping cart, then onto the conveyer at the register, and, finally, into the car for transport to my office, where we unloaded. The feeling that comes from doing this for disadvantaged kids is priceless.”

*   *   *

Wooden&Me_cover_PRWoody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Some Best Books

by Woody

Dealing Out Some Winning Books

Amos Bronson Alcott, an 18th century teacher and writer, observed: “That is a good book which is opened with expectation and closed with profit.”

Annually, I try to expectantly open 52 books and in recent years have shared brief summaries here of a few I highly recommend.

1-MBFF_coverThis year, however, I’m listing only the titles and authors of nine books that you can check out further on-line – or, better yet, in a brick-and-mortar bookstore – and focusing my attention on a 10th book I think most everyone will close with lasting profit.

New also, at the suggestion of voracious reader Scott Harris, this year I kept track of my progress by using a deck of playing cards as 52 different bookmarks.

My endorsements off the fiction shelves: Bookmark two of spades was “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee; ten of spades was “Beautiful Ruins” by Jess Walter; five of diamonds was “To Have and Have Not” by Ernest Hemingway; five of clubs was “Juncture” by Ken McAlpine; jack of clubs was “Pastures of Heaven” by John Steinbeck.

And nonfiction: Eight of clubs was “How We Got To Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World” by Steven Johnson; nine of clubs was “Death of a King: The Real Story of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Final Year” by Tavis Smiley; three of hearts was “The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution” by Walter Isaacson; jack of hearts was “Don’t Give Up, Don’t Give In: Lessons from an Extraordinary Life Hardcover” by Louis Zamperini.

Card No. 52, the king of hearts, was a serendipitous bookmark because “My Best Friend’s Funeral,” a new memoir by Ventura’s own Roger W. Thompson, gripped my heart royally.

“When you’ve cried and cried and your eyes can produce no more tears, they begin to come from someplace else,” Roger writes about the loss of his best friend of 20 years, Tim Garrety. “They come from pieces of your heart, broken like jagged stones, and must be pushed from your body. The pain is beyond bearing.”

For Roger, this unbearable pain also included his dad’s death. Roger was 13.

“I grew up believing in God and prayed earnestly for my dad to get better,” Roger writes. “I even believed the power of my prayers would save him. When he died in spite of my efforts to convince God otherwise, I eventually stopped praying. It’s hard to trust a God who doesn’t look after little kids.”

It was a kid who stepped forward to look after Roger; Tim befriended him when he most needed one.

1-insideMBFFWhile pain runs through the chapters like trout through High Sierra streams, more powerful is the friendship, fun and faith that flows. Indeed, this is a coming-of-age story revolving around surfing and skateboarding, guitars and girls, loss and love, play and work, marriage and fatherhood.

Ventura is also an important character, from Buena High School to downtown, from Hobo Jungle to Two Trees, from Surfer’s Point to Skate Street indoor skate park Roger and Tim cofounded.

Of his father’s long battle with drug addiction, Roger writes: “In the end, my hero lost. That was the day I stopped believing in heroes.”

Actually, as the pages turn and turn, we learn Roger hasn’t stopped believing. His father remains larger than life in his eyes; his grandfather is his hero; Tim’s own troubled father eventually becomes heroic, too, slaying his alcohol dragon.

And, of course, Tim is Roger’s hero.

To the reader, another hero emerges: Roger.

In the beautiful eulogy he delivers for Tim – who died at age 33, the same age Roger’s dad died – Roger said: “He lived full of faith, grace, hope, and love.”

It is an apt description of the author and “My Best Friend’s Funeral.”

Moments before delivering the eulogy for his best friend in the Ventura Theater filled – as they had once dreamed as boys in a rock band – to standing room only, Roger heard a question in his soul, in Tim’s voice: “Are you living a life that matters?”

Roger Thompson has certainly written a book that matters.

*   *   *

Wooden&Me_cover_PRWoody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

 Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Let It Rain

by Woody

Raindrops, Please Keep Fallin’ on Our Heads

Burt Bacharach composed all the right notes, but I think he got the lyrics wrong in his Oscar-winning Best Original Song “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” from the 1969 film “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.”

1-rainHe begins: “Raindrops keep falling on my head / And just like the guy whose feet are too big for his bed / Nothin’ seems to fit / Those raindrops are falling on my head, they keep falling.”

Lamenting rain? Not in California where we need to consider swapping the grizzly bear on our state flag for a Sahara camel. The rain clouds earlier this week fit just fine, thank you.

More Bacharach: “So I just did me some talkin’ to the sun / And I said I didn’t like the way he got things done / Sleepin’ on the job / Those raindrops are falling on my, head they keep falling.”

Sleeping on the job? Our Southern California sun is more overworked than a UPS driver in December. If it weren’t for homeowners living in the dangerous shadows of burned foothill areas, I’d say let our sun sleep on the job like Rip Van Winkle.

The recent rains were a welcomed sight – and sound. There is nothing like falling to sleep with raindrops dancing on the roof. Mozart never sounded sweeter, if you ask me.

As for sights, watching children walking to school in bright raincoats and ponchos or carrying Disney-character umbrellas is the stuff of Norman Rockwell even in 2014. Better yet is to see school kids jumping in puddles and even though you can’t hear their laughter over the noise of your car’s wiper blades you can vicariously feel their joy.

Equally blissful is to be a grown-up acting like a child, stomping in puddles while out on a workout run. I know because I did just that while listening to raindrops falling on my head as a soundtrack instead of the usual playlist on my iPod. Afterwards, I peeled off about 20 pounds of soaked clothes and shoes in the laundry room, all the while feeling like I was 7-years-old again and coming inside from a wet and wonderful day sledding in Ohio.

After a couple of these sloppy runs it was a letdown to have the sun quit sleepin’ on the job.

Bacharach continued: “But there’s one thing I know / The blues he sends to meet me won’t defeat me / It won’t be long ’till happiness steps up to greet me / Raindrops keep falling on my head.”

Here’s one thing I know – rain doesn’t give me the blues. Heck, I even saw a man whose backyard resembled Pompeii after Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD, interviewed on the TV news the other night saying that we need the rain and the mudslide won’t defeat him.

The scattered property damages, injuries and traffic problems aside, rain greets us with happiness. The happiness of a couple walking hand-in-hand on the beach promenade; anglers fishing off the pier; surfers doing rain dances on their boards.

Bacharach’s closing verse: “But that doesn’t mean my eyes will soon be turnin’ red / Crying’s not for me / ’Cause I’m never gonna stop the rain by complainin’ / Because I’m free / Nothing’s worrying me.”

Rain makes me feel like rejoicing, not crying. And I’m far from alone because in the past couple years I can’t remember any Californians complainin’ about rain. To the contrary, conversations and Facebook posts and Twitter tweets celebrate precipitation.

The drought is what worries us. Raindrops make us feel free. We embrace our fresh-scrubbed world because we know the sun will start gettin’ things done soon enough. It’s the storm clouds we need to do some talkin’ to.

When the raindrops keep fallin’ on my head, I feel like singin’. I think Gene Kelly’s character in the 1952 Hollywood musical “Singin’ in the Rain” got it right: “I’m singing in the rain / Just singing in the rain / What a glorious feelin’ / I’m happy again.”

Glorious, indeed. As Eric Clapton sings, “Let It Rain.” Again, soon.

*   *   *

Wooden&Me_cover_PRWoody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

 

Column: Holiday Ball Drive

by Woody

 ‘Holiday Ball Drive’ is kids’ stuff

Editorials are generally as disposable as the newsprint on which they are printed, and yet one that appeared in The New York Sun in 1897 might as well have been carved in granite because it remains relevant and favored well over a century later.

BallDriveHeadlined “Is There a Santa Claus” it began with a letter from young Virginia O’Hanlon:

“Dear Editor –

“I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, ‘If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.’ Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?”

The Sun’s reply included the now famous line, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,” and continued: “He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence.”

Indeed, how dreary would the world be with no Virginias – and, alas! no Briannas, Sarahs, Mitches and Myas.

In the spirit of love and generosity, “Woody’s Holiday Ball Drive” officially kicks off its annual efforts today to bring a small measure of joy into the lives of disadvantaged children.

The seed for this endeavor was planted about 20 years ago at a youth basketball clinic when former Ventura College and NBA star Cedric Ceballos awarded autographed basketballs to handful of lucky attendees.

Leaving the gym afterward, I happened upon a 10-year-old boy who had won one of the prized keepsakes – which he was dribbling on the rough blacktop outdoor court and shooting baskets with while perhaps imagining he was Ceballos.

Meanwhile, the real Ceballos’ Sharpie signature was wearing off.

Curious why he hadn’t carefully taken the trophy basketball home to put safely on a bookshelf, I interrupted his playing to ask.

“I’ve never had my own basketball,” the boy answered matter-of-factly between shots.

1ballsAt Christmastime, visions of that boy – and other boys and girls like him, who don’t have their own basketball to shoot or soccer ball to kick or football to throw – danced through my head. So I asked you dear readers to help make the holidays happier by dropping off a new sports ball (no batteries required) at a local Boys & Girls Club, YMCA, youth recreation center, fire department, Special Olympics chapter or house of worship. The organization’s leaders will see that the gifts wind up in deserving young hands.

Over the years you have responded like MVPs – Most Valuable Philanthropists – and I am once again asking you to deck the halls with sports balls. If you participate, please email me at woodywriter@gmail.com so I can add your generosity to this year’s tally.

It is not only kids who receive the gift balls, some of the most inspiring donors have been kids, too.

Kids like 10-year-old Sarah and 8-year-old Mitch who emptied their “Jar” of chore money to buy a soccer ball and football to donate.

Kids like 12-year-old Mya who used babysitting money to buy seven soccer balls.

Kids have used their birthday money to buy gift balls and one boy asked his grandparents for a new football – and could he please have it a week early so as to have time to donate it to someone who otherwise wouldn’t get a Christmas present?

Kids like 9-year-old Brianna, who wrote me: “I saw your wish list in the newspaper and I wanted to help. I know how important it is to help others. So this year I saved money by collecting recyclables. So I was able to give: 5 basketballs, 2 footballs, 2 soccer balls, 1 volleyball, 1 bag of baseballs, 1 bag of softballs. I hope this helps.”

What The Sun declared more than a century ago it says here today in The Star: Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and kids like Brianna, Sarah, Mitch, Mya and other amazing kids like them exist.

*   *   *

Wooden&Me_cover_PRWoody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Remarkable Rosetta Feat

by Woody

If We Can Land a Probe on a Comet . . .

Once upon a time, when a machine failed or a product disappointed, the common refrain was: “Geez, if we can land a man on the moon why can’t we . . .”

Well, times have changed. The spacecraft Rosetta, which NASA and the European Space Agency launched a decade ago, successfully rendezvoused with a comet last week.

Rosetta's probe Philae landed on a comet 300 million miles from Earth.

Rosetta’s probe Philae landed on a comet 300 million miles from Earth.

Specifically, Rosetta circled our galaxy a few times with two flybys around Earth and one slingshot pass around Mars in order to use their gravitation pull to gain speed before taking off in chase of a frozen lump of ice and interplanetary dust measuring a mere 2.5-miles in length – which is almost shorter than its official name: 67/PChuryumov-Gerasimenko.

Moreover, 67/PC-G is 300 million miles away from Earth and hurtling through space at a speed of 34,000 miles per hour! By comparison, the average bullet goes a pedestrian 1,700 mph.

After its 10-year journey that covered a total of 3.97 billion-with-a-B miles, Rosetta dropped a probe named Philae aimed at the comet. Philae bounced twice before coming to rest on the target. It was a more challenging feat than teeing off a golf ball at Pebble Beach and making a hole-in-one on the moon.

In addition to sending back photos and scientific data, the mission has also accomplished something else: the phrase, “If we can land a man on the moon . . .” is now as quaint as a rotary phone.

Henceforth, when a product falls short of expectations or a machine falters badly, our complaint should begin: “Geez, if we can land a spacecraft on a comet speeding 20 times faster than a bullet some 300 million miles away, why can’t we . . .”

. . . train ourselves to take reusable bags to stores instead of wasting so much energy fighting over whether plastic bags are a constitutional right or a terrorist plot?

. . . find a cure for the common cold?

. . . create a vaccine, and quickly, for Ebola?

. . . invent a TV remote that my much-better-half cannot accidentally, and routinely, disarm the satellite dish receiver with?

. . . design a microwave oven that isn’t so befuddling to me that I wind up defrosting popcorn and popping frozen bagels?

. . . make newsprint that prevents the ink from coming off on the reader’s hands?

. . . build a home smoke alarm in which replacing the battery isn’t more difficult than solving Rubik’s Cube while balancing on a wobbly ladder?

. . . eradicate spam email and physical junk mail off the face of the Earth?

. . . eradicate concussions and permanent brain injuries from football?

. . . invent a Star Trek-like force shield for automobiles that repulses shopping carts and other car’s opening doors?

. . . re-invent airliner coach seating with knee room for anyone taller than a kindergartener?

. . . invent a method for deboarding a jetliner, after it reaches the arrival gate, with minimal chaos in less time than the flight itself takes?

. . . create a vaccine for rudeness?

. . . discover technology for plastic surgery that doesn’t scream on the patient’s face afterwards: I HAD WORK DONE!

. . . invent turn signals that automatically shut off after a driver has changed lanes and left it blinking for a full mile?

. . . put a woman (democrat or republican) in the Oval Office?

. . . design a pill that dogs like to take instead of having to be wrestled with like alligators until they finally choke the medicine down?

. . . design an easy-to-take pill that makes all breeds of dogs and cats stop shedding all over the furniture, floors and clothes?

. . . decide one way or the other on Daylight Saving Time year-round or not at all and quit this Spring Forward, Fall Back nonsense?

. . . build a transcontinental pipeline to move snow (melted) from the north east to Southern California?

. . . develop a way to pre-empt large earthquakes by dividing them up into orchestrated small shakes?

. . . create a vaccine for procrastination? (Scientists probably plan to work on that later.)

And lastly, “Geez, if we can land a spacecraft on a comet speeding 20 times faster than a bullet 300 million miles away, why can’t we . . . put a man back on the moon – or at least launch American astronauts into space on our own NASA rockets?

*   *   *

Wooden&Me_cover_PRWoody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Tomb of Unknown Soldier

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s highly anticipated new book “STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” is NOW available! Order your signed copy HERE! 

*   *   *

Honoring Unknowns Not Enough

When it comes to the greatest streaks ever, Joe DiMaggio’s 56 consecutive games with a hit in 1941 and Cal Ripken’s “Ironman” run of playing in 2,632 consecutive games come quickly to mind.

For team efforts, the Los Angeles Lakers winning 33 consecutive games during the 1971-72 season and the UCLA Bruins’ 88 victories in row from 1971-1974 stand out.

1-tombBut a far more amazing streak has taken place outside the sports arena. It is a streak that truly matters. A streak of 77 consecutive years. And counting.

Beginning at midnight July 2, 1937, The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery has been guarded continuously, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year – 366 days during Leap Years – by Sentinels of the elite Third United States Infantry Regiment “Old Guard.”

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night has stayed them from their appointed duty. When destructive Hurricane Isabel struck in 2003 orders were actually sent to the Sentinels to seek shelter for personal safety, but they disobeyed the command and the streak remained unbroken.

The original Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a white marble sarcophagus unveiled on Nov. 11, 1921 with the remains of a World War I hero. Because three flat white marble graves with the interments of unknown soldiers from World War II, Korea and Vietnam have since been added, it is often now called the Tomb of the Unknowns.

Inscribed on the raised tomb are the words: “Here Rests In Honored Glory An American Soldier Known But To God.” After DNA testing in 1998 identified the “Vietnam Unknown,” its crypt was changed to “Honoring And Keeping Faith With America’s Missing Servicemen.”

Watching the ritual in person is haunting and heartwarming, both. The on-duty Sentinel marches, almost in slow-motion, 21 steps south in front of the Tomb; crisply turns and faces east towards the Tomb for 21 seconds; turns again to face north and executes a sharp “shoulder-arms” movement switching his or her rifle to the outside shoulder away from the tomb; waits another 21 seconds before marching 21 steps back as the process begins anew in the other direction.

The 21 steps and 21-second pauses symbolize the 21-gun salute, which is the highest of military honors.

Every 30 minutes during summer, and every hour in winter, an elaborate  “Changing of the Guard” ceremony takes place. Visitors are asked to stand and remain silent. In truth, at all times there seems to be a hush of reverence by those in attendance.

The pomp and circumstance continues even at nighttime when the cemetery is closed to visitors because in truth it is not performed for show for the spectators, it is all done as a show of honor for all unaccounted American combat soldiers.

The Tomb of the Unknowns came to my mind this Veteran’s Day as flags flew across Ventura County and the nation. The Sentinels’ nonstop dedication to their sacred mission made me wish we would all show our respect and gratitude to veterans 365 days a year instead of largely only on a handful of days including Veterans Day and Memorial Day and anniversaries such as Dec. 7 and Sept. 11.

Furthermore, it seems an added tragedy that we give more attention to deceased warriors at the Tomb of the Unknowns than we give our living soldiers who come home from battle only to often face a new battle trying to get healthcare through the Veterans Affairs Department.

Granted, restructuring is underway under new VA Secretary Robert McDonald, but this is expected to take a year at the least. With an estimated 22 veterans committing suicide daily we should be attacking this problem with the urgency – and funding – as though it were a terrorist attack on American soil.

John Steinbeck writes in “East of Eden”: “I’ll have you know that a soldier is the most holy of all humans because he is the most tested – most tested of all.”

That test should end when his or her active duty ends. It’s time to start a streak of better honoring and keeping the faith with our known soldiers.

*   *   *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden&Me_cover_PRCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Irish laughs and wisdom

by Woody

By Popular Request, Irish Leftovers

A number of readers kindly said they enjoyed my recent four-column series on my Ireland travels and asked if I might have more stories to share.

In response, here are some Irish sayings I saw in various pubs and on headstones, all bookended between two tales told to me by cabbies.

*

1guinnessAn Irishman pops into a Dublin pub one evening and orders three pints of Guinness. When the bartender brings them the Irishman carefully lines them up and proceeds to take a sip from each glass, one after another, over and over, until all three are empty.

He orders three more pints, prompting the bartender to ask: “Suit ye’self, but mightn’t you rather I bring ’em one at a time so they’re cold and fresh?”

“No, no,” the Irishman replies. “I’m preferrin’ ye bring ’em three at a time. Ye see, me and me two brothers used to meet up and have a good time drinking together. But now one’s in Canada and the other’s in America so we drink in each other’s honor this way once a week.”

“That’s a brilliant tradition,” says the bartender, bringing three more pints on the house.

Months pass and the Irishman becomes well known in the pub for his honorary quirk. One day, however, he orders only two pints.

A somber hush falls over the pub. Setting two beers before the man, the bartender offers his sincere condolences.

For a moment the Irishman is confused but then realizes the mistake and laughs: “No, no, one of me brothers ain’t dead. It’s just that my missus has made ME give up drinking.”

*

“May the saddest day of your future be no worse than the happiest day of your past.”

*

“No man ever wore a scarf as warm as his daughter’s arm around his neck.”

*

1irishsaying“May the road rise to meet you.

“May the wind be always at your back.

“May the sun shine warm upon your face.

“And rains fall soft upon your fields.

“And until we meet again,

“May God hold you in the hollow of His hand.”

*

“Always remember to forget, the troubles that passed away.

“But never forget to remember, the blessings that come each day.”

*

“May you have warm words on a cold evening, a full moon on a dark night, and a smooth road all the way to your door.”

*

“There are good ships, and there are wood ships, the ships that sail the sea.

“But the best ships, are friendships, and may they always be.”

*

“May misfortune follow you the rest of your life, and never catch up.”

*

1glassguinnessAn Irish farmer walks three miles into town on a Friday night after a long week in the fields and orders a pint of Guinness. The pub is unusually quiet so he decides to liven things up, announcing to all: “I bet 100 pounds that no one here can drink 15 pints in 15 minutes.”

A man in the far corner seems angered by the broken silence and abruptly leaves. No one steps forward to accept the challenge.

About 20 minutes later the insulted man returns, strides up to the bar and slaps down a 100-pound bill: “I’m in!”

“Fifteen Guinness and line ’em up!” orders the farmer, excitedly. When the glasses are ready he takes out his pocket watch and the contest begins.

The farmer calls out each passing minute and like clockwork the challenger downs a pint every 60 seconds. After 10 minutes he has finished 10 pints, but his pace is slowing.

With the call of “Fourteen minutes!” there remain two full pints.

Just as the bet seems lost, however, the challenger theatrically raises a glass in each hand and triumphantly chugs them one after the other with 15 seconds to spare.

“Congratulations!” says the farmer, handing over 100 pounds. “But I do have one question – where did you storm off to before you came back.”

Came the answer: “One hundred pounds is a lot of money, ye know, so I went to the pub across the street to make sure I could do it.”

*   *   *

Wooden&Me_cover_PRWoody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”