Category Archives: Columns

Fast-Break Iambic Rhythms

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! 

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Iambic Rhythms at Fast-Break Pace

What do Alexander Hamilton and John Wooden have in common? An obvious answer is the number 10: Hamilton is on the 10-dollar bill and Wooden won a record 10 NCAA national championships as a basketball coach.

Meanwhile, about the last denominator the legendary secretary of the treasury and legendary Wizard of Westwood would seem to share is hip-hop music.1raphamilton

Well, the critically acclaimed Broadway musical “Hamilton” is performed in rap lyrics. Lin-Manuel Miranda, the creative genius who wrote the music, lyrics and playbook, is making rap more mainstream than March Madness office pools. Indeed, “Hamilton” is harder to get tickets to than the Final Four and here’s an iambic fast-break highlight why:

“How does a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a Scotsman, dropped in the middle of a forgotten / spot in the Caribbean by Providence impoverished in squalor grow up to be a hero and a scholar?

“The Ten dollar, founding father without a father / got a lot farther by working a lot harder / by being a lot smarter by being a self-starter / by fourteen, they placed him in charge of a trading charter.”

Take a breath, because that is only the first 10 seconds of the four-minute opening song. Act I has 24 songs in all and Act II has 23.

Which brings us to three other rap songs, the video links to which a friend emailed me, asking: “What do you think Coach Wooden would think?”

In his offering “Wooden Heart,” artist Fearce Vill mixes imagery Coach would admire along with some Wooden-isms:

“I go the hard route / I don’t play it safe / because the scuff on my shoe represents / what I’ve been through / so I’m gonna keep runnin’, runnin’

“The scuff on my shoe represents / what I’ve been through / so I’m gonna take one day at a time / one day at a time

“Things turn out best for the people / who make the best of the way things turn out / Everybody want a free throw / but nobody want to work for it”

The artist known as “Freestyle” offers these slam-dunk lines:

“John Wooden taught me / you get back what you put in it / The things he said are music to my ears

“He taught us that a poor man’s wealth is his ability / Winning takes talent / to repeat takes character / That’s what he taught the people across America

“Success is never final / failure is never fatal / What counts is the courage you bring to the table.”

And in “The Keys,” Megan Ran uses the rhythmic verbal beat of a quickly dribbled basketball while incorporating Wooden’s famous Pyramid of Success along with other maxims:

“Most times we won / before we even stepped upon the court / Tools for life much bigger than any sport / Life lessons for leaders, athletes and teachers / even musicians pushing education through the speakers on me

“Yeah, on me / these are the keys, ready / enthusiasm, intentness, loyalty, dedication, physical and mental fitness, self-control, confidence, poise, skill and condition / Better get on your mission / to make it come to fruition

“Little things make big things happen / Make each day your masterpiece / Never forget the team /Always keep the ‘we’ before the ‘me’ / Ask questions / because these here are the best lessons / Follow these keys and success is destined.”

Now back to my friend Bill’s question of what Wooden might think of these rap songs were he alive today. I think, like me, he would love them!

After all, Coach had a passion for poetry – reading, writing, reciting. Indeed, listening to these hip-hop tributes reminds me of how Coach would oftentimes recite a poem, fast-paced, almost rapper-like.

Too, I believe he would be pleased that his teachings are being shared with a new generation and audience.

Coach Wooden, however, might have had one reminder for Fearce Vill, Megan Ran, Freestyle, and the cast of “Hamilton” – “Be quick, but don’t hurry.”

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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”

My Farming Roots Run Deep

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! 

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Family Roots: Soil, Seed and Corn

This Tuesday past was National Agriculture Day, a day I observed by enjoying some fresh guacamole made from local-grown avocados and earlier giving thanks to those doing backbreaking work in a strawberry field as I drove past.

As John Greenleaf Whittier wrote: “Give fools their gold, and knaves their power; let fortune’s bubbles rise and fall; who sows a field, or trains a flower, or plants a tree, is more than all.”

And, the poet should have added, he and she who harvest a field.1cornpic

My farming roots run five generations deep into the rich soil of Ohio.

My paternal great grandfather, J.D., in particular, was renowned in the agricultural community. His 330-acre farm on Route 68, south of the small town of Urbana, was saturated with nutrients from long-ago floodings of the Mad River. On this fertile land, over many years, he developed what respectfully became know far and wide simply as “Woodburn Corn.”

J.D. began with a variety of dark corn called “Ripley” that his grandfather began growing on the family farm 70 years earlier as animal feed. J.D. cross-pollinated Ripley with a light-colored variety called “Loudenbark.” The result was what you would expect: ears of corn with a mix of both light and dark kernels.

For several successive years, J.D. selected the darker of these new ears to use as seed to repeat the process, believing this would result in a more robust and bountiful variety.

A few years into his experimentation, J.D. tested his hypothesis by planting his hybrid seed in a side-by-side test. Specifically, he sowed seven acres with the darker selection he favored and seven acres with the lighter kernels he was trying to eliminate. To his surprise, the lighter corn out-yielded the dark – and greatly so.

Thereon, J.D. switched his focus to developing an improved variety of light-colored corn. Importantly, he also selected the ears with the largest kernels – the result being corn with more animal feed per ear. He ultimately would spend more than four decades improving his corn.

About 10 years into the process, a grain elevator worker noticed that J.D.’s corn was far superior to the other corn coming in. The worker started recommending it to others, and soon J.D. was selling all his extra seed to neighbor farmers – and much further away, too.

And for good reason: J.D.’s “Woodburn Corn” won the gold medal for the Utility Contest at the Ohio State Fair as well as the silver medal for Yield. With a test result of 98-percent germination, J.D.’s entry crop in the ten-acre contest resulted in 112.64 bushels of corn per acre.

“Topping one-hundred bushels per acre was like breaking the four-minute mile,” my dad recalls, adding of his trips as a young boy to the State Fair: “Farmers from all over would come up to ask Grandpa for advice.”

Interestingly, and remarkably, J.D. grew the prize bounty without using any manure or fertilizer. Rather, he simply grew it in a virgin pasture – that is how fertile his farmland was. “One of the choicest farms of his township,” according to The History of Champagne County, Ohio.

However, it took more than choice magical land to grow medal-winning crops.

“Good seed, that’s the one big secret of our crop,” J.D. told a newspaper reporter. “But I don’t know as you would call it a secret. It’s a thing any good farmer knows.”

While my great-grandfather won prizes for his corn, my great uncle – “Unc” – earned his own measure of local fame in Urbana for his green thumb.

Instead of using wooden stakes for his garden beans to climb, Unc got the idea to plant a single sunflower seed inside each circle of planted bean seeds – the beans, he reasoned, would then be able to climb the rising sunflower stock.

Well, as they say, the best laid plans . . .

The beans withered and died because the sunflowers bogarted the extra fertilizer and water intended for the beans. Not all was lost, however, as Unc boasted – and was teased for – “the tallest crop of sunflowers in town.”

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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”

Part 1: Miracle Man Alvin

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! 

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Remarkable Journey to Starting Line

The race aside, Alvin Matthews’ journey to the starting line of the 2016 Los Angeles Marathon is a remarkable story in itself.

Alvin’s racing resume does not suggest it was a prodigious feat for him to be among more than 20,000 people lining up for the 26.2-mile challenge three weeks past. After all, the 45-year-old Ventura native had previously run 20 marathons with a PR of 3 hours, 13 minutes.

A cold Alvin Matthews at the top of the world!

A cold Alvin Matthews at the top of the world!

More impressively, Alvin has finished marathons around the globe in North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and Antarctica. He lacks only South America to join the select “Marathon Grand Slam Club” with 73 members to date who have completed marathons on all seven continents, plus the North Pole.

Yes, Alvin completed – “survived” is more accurate – the North Pole Marathon in frostbite conditions that would make a polar bear shiver. In addition to a race-day temperature of minus-27 degrees Fahrenheit, the 6-foot-2, 175-pound competitor had to forge through knee-high powered snow for five-plus hours. It wasn’t a marathon so much as an expedition like Robert Peary made more than a century ago.

By comparison, Alvin completed the Antarctic Ice Marathon in balmy 10-degree weather.

Conversely, in true heat, Alvin has also completed a 56-mile ultra marathon in South Africa. To be sure, the 1989 Buena High graduate has heavy mettle.

Two years ago, all those marathons, combined one after another into one mega race, was a smaller challenge than what Alvin suddenly faced.

In spring 2014, Alvin was living in Lebanon and working as a contractor overseeing civilian construction. Away from the dangers of the work site, tragedy befell him.

On April 15, he found himself locked out of his house. Because it was built into the side of a hill, Alvin had easy access to the flat rooftop that he could walk across to reach an open balcony. He had previously done this several times.

“This time I slipped,” Alvin recalls, “and fell three stories.”

He landed on concrete, on his neck, suffering what his doctors termed a “catastrophic spinal cord injury at the level C5 to C7.”

Translation: quadriplegia.

What Alvin shares next, and unbelievably with a smile, reveals his unbreakable courage and character: “I’m fortunate. If I landed a few inches either way, it could have been worse.”

With a state-of-the-art hospital in Beirut deemed too far away, Alvin was taken to a local facility that did not even have computer technology. Fortunately, an expert team of neurosurgeons was brought in from the capital. One of the doctors called Alvin’s survival “a miracle.”

The Miracle Man remained in the hospital for 25 days before returning to the United States. Two months in UC Davis Medical Center Hospital was followed by six weeks at the highly acclaimed Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago.

When catastrophe strikes, Alvin says there are two possible paths: self-pity or fortitude. He chose the latter, tackling rehab like it was a “Grand Slam” marathon.

Initially barely able to move only his left side, through diligent physical therapy Alvin slowly regained some movement and strength in both shoulders and arms. Use of his once-dominant right hand remains greatly limited, but he has become adept at most things with his left hand even though its coordination is also compromised.

“The support of family and friends, and also strangers rallying around me, has kept me going,” Alvin shares.

One such friend is Jim Freeman, who had helped coach Alvin for the 2010 L.A. Marathon. Now he invited Alvin to join Team NutriBullet as its only wheelchair athlete.

After the first practice, after seeing Alvin struggle with only his left hand able to grip a wheel to propel his chair, team members organized a fundraiser to buy an $8,000 top-of-the-line racing handcycle.

Days before the 2016 L.A. Marathon, Alvin received his sleek, three-wheel, 30-gear dream machine that allows his weak hands to be securely strapped into the “pedals.” With only two short test rides under his belt, Alvin rolled to the starting line.

He recalls worrying: “Can I do this?”

Next week in this space we will learn the answer.

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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”

Strawberries Sweet in All Seasons

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! 

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Strawberries Sweet in All Seasons

Jim Murray, my writing hero, once told me he regretted his modesty in not doing a column about his memoir when it came out. This lesson, combined with numerous readers of this space asking me about the meaning behind the title of my new book of essays, “Strawberries in Wintertime,” leads me to shamelessly share the backstory.

In my boyhood, I fondly remember picking wild blackberries and raspberries on humid summer days at a weekend cabin in rural Ohio. My two older brothers, younger sister, and I filled pail after pail with ripe berries – and nearly as many berries went directly into our mouths as into the buckets.1berriesstand

So plentiful were the blackberries, especially, that my dad made wine with them. Once. Not only did the blackberry vino prove undrinkable, Mom’s pots and pans were stained purple beyond ruin in the process.

Still, wild blackberries and raspberries, and store-bought strawberries, in summertime were always a delicious treat. Too, an expected one.

Berries in the wintertime, in the Midwest, however, are something I cannot recall from my youth. I am sure they were available at the supermarket in the 1960s for a premium, but Mom never brought them home.

So it was a magical winter indeed when my family took a Christmas vacation to Ventura in 1971 and spent a week at the charming Solimar beach house of family friends. I had never before seen the ocean in person, much less bodysurfed and built sandcastles or explored tidal pools at low tide and chased a “grunion run” under a full moon’s high tide.

And here is something else magical: fresh strawberries in wintertime!1berriesflat

Instead of by the bucketful as with Ohio blackberries, we enjoyed Southern California strawberries by the “flat” topless box containing a dozen plastic pint baskets with a bonus pint piled atop.

I am guessing, but I imagine the price for the entire overflowing flat from a roadside farmer’s stand in Saticoy – for Ventura County was then, as it remains today, the nation’s leading producer of strawberries – wasn’t much more than the cost of a single pint basket in a Midwest grocery store in December.

The temptation during the drive from the farmer’s stand back to the beach house was too tempting to resist. In the car, en route, I ate crabapple-sized strawberries by the handful, by the mouthful, sweet red nectar dripping down my chin.

The following summer we moved from Columbus to Ventura and strawberries became a year-round fare. Still, in my mind they have remained a special treat in wintertime. Hence the title of my newest book, as I hope each offering will make the reader smile and want to devour another.

Indeed, over the years “Strawberries in Wintertime” to me has become a metaphor for an unexpected pleasure in any season. For example, meeting my wife at a college Christmas party was certainly a strawberry-in-wintertime event – and so was having John Wooden befriend me a few years later in springtime.

A surprise birthday party, even in summer, is a strawberry in wintertime – and so is a planned trip in autumn that proves to be magical at every turn.

The point, I suppose, is that by paying attention and having the right frame of mind, our own strawberries in wintertime can fill a “flat” to overflowing no matter what page the calendar shows.

Watching an elementary school play or a Broadway show, cheering at a youth track meet or an Olympic race, building a sandcastle or visiting a castle in Ireland, can all be strawberries in wintertime.

Bumping into an old classmate or finding an email in your inbox from a friend you haven’t heard from in years, these too are strawberries in wintertime.

When I think back to my first visit to Ventura, or in fact any time I stroll on the beach or dive into the surf, I am reminded of this advice from Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Live in the sunshine, swim the sea, drink the wild air.”

In my mind, he should have added: “And eat strawberries in wintertime.”

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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”

Wedding Story With a Twist

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! 

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Wedding Love Story With a Twist

We felt like interlopers, nearly, in Agoura Hills last Saturday. But like the “Wedding Crashers” characters played by Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn, my wife and I had an absolute blast.

To be honest, being invited was a surprise because the only person I knew was the groom.

Added honesty: the invitation made my heart sing, as did the tearful bear hug my tuxedoed friend greeted me with before the ceremony. You would have thought we went back two decades instead of only a couple years.

But, as one of the groomsmen noted in his dinner toast, that is the magic of Jon – he makes all his friends feel like they are his best one.

Jon has many more magical qualities, perhaps none more endearing than how he wears his heart on his sleeve. Actually, his heart seems to be tattooed on his wrist.

Jon and his dad

Jon and his dad

So it was no surprise that as each groomsman and bridesmaid walked down the aisle, Jon’s tears flowed. When the bride appeared, the trickle became Niagara Falls. His visible love was almost as beautiful as the bride herself.

After exchanging lovely vows and rings and a first kiss as wife and husband, Jon stomped on a glass and the gathering shouted “Mazel tov!” – Congratulations! – and the party was on.

Later, as the DJ earned his pay and the dance floor earned its rental fee, I spotted the father of the groom across the ballroom sitting alone at the head table. After introducing myself, the DNA source of Jon’s warmth was obvious.

I wanted to tell him about my first meeting with his son. As he had talked about his writing career, Jon lit up; discussing music and movies, he beamed more; and when he spoke about Natasha, whom he had only recently started dating, he fairly glowed.

But even this joy grew 100 watts brighter when Jon began sharing stories about his dad. This is what I shared, for while the dad certainly already knew about Jon’s love for him. it is always nice to hear such things.

In his toast, Jon’s dad had mentioned how his son phones him at midnight just to say “hi,” or to share this or that, or tell him to listen to a certain song. When Pavarotti died, Jon called in tears because he remembered listening to “The Three Tenors” with his “Pops.”

“How did you become such good friends with your son?” the father privately told me he is often asked. His answer: “I did the opposite of what my dad did.”

He explained that his own dad, a child of The Great Depression, felt his fatherhood duties began and ended with paying the mortgage and putting food on the table. And so he didn’t attend Little League games or Boy Scout gatherings. He gave reprimand, not praise, for report cards with even one B.

Jon’s father did the opposite. He went to every youth game and cheered for his son off the playing fields as well. He took young Jon to trading card shows far and near. He showed an interest in his son’s interests. He gave his time and offered praise and, no small thing, frequently told all his children he loved them.

In short, he was the dad he had not had.

When Jon was 8, his father shared with me proudly, Jon found a wallet containing $100 and on his own turned it into the police. This is not surprising after spending time with Jon’s role model.

Indeed, that private time off to the side of the ballroom, off the dance floor and away from the excitement, visiting with Jon’s dad was every bit as heartwarming as the wedding vows and cake-cutting ceremony and toasts recollecting how Natasha knew Jon was “the one” after their first date and how it wasn’t long before Jon proposed on bended knee in the aisle of a Southwest flight 30,000 feet in the sky.

I came to the wedding knowing Jon was a special man, but I left knowing why he chose his dad to serve as his “best man.”

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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”

Getting Things Off My Chest

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! 

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Mr. Positive Takes a Negative Spin

A reader recently told me she likes my columns because they are always upbeat and positive. She meant it as a compliment, of course, but after waking up on the wrong side of the bed I see it as being typecast.

So if you were expecting 700 words of Winsome Woody this morning, you are going to be as disappointed as the proud owner of Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat finding himself driving a Prius.

If you want sugar and nice, phone your grandma. I’m in a Donald Trump ranting at the “wise-guy media” kind of mood.

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1superbowllogoI’m steamed at the NFL for switching away from Roman numerals this season and calling its championship game “Super Bowl 50” instead of “Super Bowl L.”

How are school kids, and the rest of us, supposed to learn or remember Roman numerals now? On a scale of I to C, my ticked-off meter is at about

LXXXVIII.

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The Nincompoop Football League didn’t ask me, but this year’s game should be marketed as “Super BowL.”

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I’m churning mad at the Pacific Ocean for beating up our beloved Ventura Pier this winter.

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Tom Spence, community treasure and host at News Talk 1590 KVTA radio, ticks me off for being about XLIII times more funny than am I, as evidenced by this gem he came up with after Sarah Palin droned on and on while endorsing Donald Trump for president:

“A ‘Palindrone’ is something that does not make sense forward or backwards.”

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As for palindromes with an “m,” I prefer “I prefer pi” over “Tacocat.” However, I do prefer tacos over apple pi.

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The debates – Republican and Democratic – have me steam me like a frothy cappuccino.

Even more annoying than the candidates’ Palindroning and pandering is the moderators constantly harping “Time!” . . . “Time, senator/governor/secretary!” . . . “Time’s up, so please shut up!” while the politicians continue to blabber on.

I say it’s time put up a countdown talk clock, much like the NBA’s 24-second shot clock. In this case, when the clock hits zero a buzzer goes off and the podium mic is instantly shut off. If the candidate is in mid-sentence, though luck.

Better yet, place each podium above a dunk tank – candidates who continue to blow hot air after the buzzer sounds will find themselves drenched in cold water.

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The Southern California Gas Co. has me ready to blow my lid. I say make every SoCal Gas executive live in Porter Ranch 24/7 until the months-long natural gas leak is stopped.

I’m XCIX-percent certain that would make them act with more urgency.

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Similarly, force Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder along with all the leaders at the state Department of Environmental Quality to live – and bathe – in Flint, XXIV/VII, until the lead pipes that are poisoning the water are replaced.

Again, I guarantee you the crisis would suddenly be addressed with the all-out effort it rightly demands.

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Speaking of less-than-express action that steams me like an espresso, how about if the Post Office replaces its maple sap-slow window clerks with hyper-speed multi-tasking Starbucks baristas?

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Litter ticks me off, off the charts, especially people who throw cigarette butts out car windows and most especially those who pollute our beautiful beaches with this blight.

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Homelessness. We can, and must, do better.

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I get a surge of road rage that makes my head spin like the titanium-spoked wheel of a racing bike when I read in my favorite newspaper, seemingly weekly, about another cyclist being struck by a car.

To be sure, cyclists who feel like they own the road are maddening – but in my experience they are the minority of the Spandex set.

More maddening, and I believe more common, are impatient drivers who don’t want to share the road with cyclists – and, worse yet, make their displeasure known by buzzing dangerously close when passing them.

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My DCC words are up. Thanks for reading. You’ve been a great audience. Drive safely.

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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”

 

This and That, Plus Balls Tally

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s new book STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter is available for Pre-Order HERE NOW! In time for the holidays!

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This, that and final holiday ball tally

            Nobody asked me, but here goes anyway . . .

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It has certainly been “raining cats and dogs” this week, which raises the question: How in the world did that crazy expression originate?

During my trip to Ireland last year, I got the answer – or, at least, one that makes as much sense as any.1catsdogsrain

During a countryside tour of County Cork, our guide pointed out a number of traditional thatched roofs that still exist. He explained that when these roofs were the standard long ago, cats and dogs actually climbed up, burrowed into, and slept inside the thick straw.

When it rained exceptionally hard, the animals would jump out to escape from near drowning. Hence the expression, “It’s raining cats and dogs.”

Even if our Irish guide was pulling our American legs, I like it!

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The word “unbelievable,” I believe, is greatly overworked.

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Listen up, NFL and NCAA football! Either do away with the rule against offensive players pushing, pulling and using forklifts to assist the ball carrier, or start throwing the penalty flag. It looks like a rugby scrum on 25 percent of the running plays!

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I lack all musical genes, and have no songwriting experience whatsoever, but I am still convinced I could write a hit for Adele.

Shoot, I believe she could sing this column and make it sound wonderful, so unbelievable is her voice.

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Speaking of unbelievable voices, Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully once told me about a fantastic book he had just finished reading, “The Professor and the Madman.”

Hearing him summarize this story behind the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary made me think that Scully could read straight from the Oxford English Dictionary and make it sound like poetry set to music.

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The Jane Laut murder trial in Ventura County for the fatal shooting of her husband, former Olympic athlete Dave Laut, is finally set to begin next week.

Understand, the shooting took place on August 29, 2009 – more than six years ago. And only now, in January 2016, the trial? Unbelievable!

The judge and court didn’t ask me, and I only know what I read in my favorite newspaper, but that is so glacier-ly slow it seems here like one or both sides have been more focused on playing games and stalling rather than on pursuing timely justice. That’s just my two cents.

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The lighting in grocery stores is truly unbelievable: bananas that appear a nice yellow turn out to be green as limes when I get them home in sunlight.

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Nobody who contributed to “Woody’s Holiday Ball Drive” asked to be recognized in print, but I feel their generosity deserves nothing less and is a small measure of thanks for the disadvantaged kids they made smile.

Contributors not mentioned here previously include, in no special order: Marty and Freida Harary, Bill Ferguson, Tom and Sheila McCollum, Jim and Sandie Arthur, Kay Giles, Michael Mariani, Norma Fulkerson, Howard and Kathy Reich, Tom and Karyne Roweton, Brad and Mia Ditto, Audrey Rubin, Orvene Carpenter, Lisa Trout, Ann and Kevin Drescher, Steve Magoon, Steve Askay, Patricia Herman, Kathy and Jim Vargeson, Arlys Tuttle, Gayle Camalich, Trudy Tuttle Arriaga, Toni Tuttle-Santana, Kymberly King, Doug Woodburn, Jim Woodburn, James Woodburn, Linda Reynolds, Sally and Tom Reeder, Kathy and Joe Vaughan, and many anonymous angels as well.

Also, shoutouts to Draza Mrvichin, who gave a mix of 14 balls; my former next-door neighbor from childhood, Norma Zuber, and her PEO Sisterhood service group, which donated 19 various balls; and Jerry and Linda Mendelsohn, who donated 20 balls evenly split between basketball and soccer.

The finally tally from this past holiday season was . . .

. . . drum roll, please . . .

. . . a whopping 253 new sports balls – up from 211 a year ago – broken down thusly: 148 basketballs, 62 soccer balls, 27 footballs and 16 playground balls.

Thank you, dear readers. Your kindness is unbelievable.

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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”

 

Advice: Chase Butterflies

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s new book STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter is available for Pre-Order HERE NOW! In time for the holidays!

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My Your Heart Go Aflutter in New Year

Chase butterflies.

When asked recently to write a brief essay on the topic of “A Letter Of Advice To My 21-Year-Old Self,” that was my answer in a nutshell. Chase butterflies.

I will soon explain more fully.1butterfly

But first let me say that chasing butterflies also seems timely advice, for anyone of any age, as we begin our 2016 journey around the sun.

Even though spring is yet a far ways off, the turning of the calendar pages from the old year to the new always brings to my mind a butterfly emerging from its cocoon. The caterpillar’s past has been shed and left behind; the world is anew and bright and full of promise.

Moreover, most butterflies emerge in the morning – again, the image of a new year’s fresh beginning. Indeed, New Year resolutions are goals for a personal metamorphosis of sorts.

But my advice to chase butterflies is more than metaphorical.

Remember in your youth when you raced after Monarchs with a butterfly net? There are few images of girlhood or boyhood more carefree.

Perhaps you did not even catch any butterflies. That didn’t even matter because the joy was in the running, in the sport of it, in the zig-zagging through a field until you were out of breath – the breathlessness, in part, from laughing at your “failure” to catch the elusive fluttering prey.

Lesson from the child: when is the last time as an adult you didn’t let “failure” get you down and instead happily laughed it off?

Yes, we would all do well to pursue our adult passions with this same sense of joy and play as we did racing barefooted in the grass with a cheesecloth net-on-a-stick in our hands.

Chasing butterflies also means embracing things that scare you – things that make your stomach flutter with nervousness.

As I wrote in that letter to my 21-year-old college self: “Remember the swarm of butterflies doing cartwheels in your stomach the first time you asked out that gorgeous girl you are now dating? Spoiler alert, Woody, that works out marvelously even 34 years later!”

The butterflies of trying new things and taking chances should not be avoided. The riskier thing, truly, is to remain inside a safe cocoon. As the Roman poet Virgil noted, “Fortune favors the bold.”

Fortune favors butterfly chasers, I say.

Or as Mark Twain so wisely put it: “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”

And, he might have well added, do things that make the butterflies in your belly dance.

Eleanor Roosevelt knew this, famously advising: “Do one thing every day that scares you.”1Bold

If the word “scares” scares you, keep in mind that “frightening” is a close cousin of “exciting.” So when a new challenge or unchartered adventure or out-of-your-comfort-zone opportunity gives you butterflies, run (BEGINITAL)towards(ENDITAL) it not from it!

Throw off your bowlines and learn a new language. Take guitar lessons. Or golf lessons. Enroll in a painting class. Sign up for volunteer work.

Train for a marathon. Learn to surf. Climb Mount Whitney.

Start writing that novel you have long felt you had inside you. Ask someone on a date – or accept the invite.

Join Toastmasters and tackle your fear of public speaking. Tackle a career change from the safe job you have, but doesn’t excite you, to the one of your dreams.

Travel. Explore. Go sailing. Go for it!

I closed my letter to my younger self with John Wooden’s “7-Point Creed,” which I consider to be concise wisdom of great breadth and depth:

Be true to yourself.

Make each day your masterpiece.

Help others.

Drink deeply from good books.

Make friendship a fine art.

Build a shelter against a rainy day.

Pray for guidance and give thanks for your blessings every day.

And, I concluded, add this eighth point: Chase butterflies.

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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”

 

Special Birthday Request

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s new book STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter is available for Pre-Order HERE NOW! In time for the holidays!

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Turning Down a Birthday Request

            The letter writer was polite, almost apologetic, and full of praise. Also, as is often the case when readers reach out to me, had a request.

“First of all, thanks for taking the time to read this email,” Chuck Herrera began. “I would like to say I enjoy reading your column every Saturday in the Ventura County Star and also in the past had enjoyed your sports write ups in the Star-Free Press.

“I just recently got a great tip last week in The Star about a cool book sale in Santa Paula where I purchased all kinds of great books and music. I tell you, my purchases were the best entertainment value I have had in quite some time.

“In the digital age, I still prefer turning book pages. A couple of books of interest I picked up were “Jim Murray: The Last of the Best” and your book “Wooden & Me” which I plan on giving to one of my brothers for Christmas. He is a huge Coach Wooden fan.

“Another reason I am writing . . .”

Aha, after the introductory butter-up here comes the favor request.

“. . . is because I have five brothers and the one I plan on giving your book to, his name is Ron, and it happens to be his birthday on Christmas Day. And this year is a special birthday for him.

“He is turning 60, which for him is truly a miracle because Ron was born in 1955 and he was born with Spina Bifida with a slim-to-none chance to survive. But my parents refused to believe that and took him home and cared for him and loved him. If there were a Parents Hall of Fame, they would have been first-time ballot selections.

“Ron is amazing. He has never kicked a football in his life, but by studying books, film, clinics, etc., he learned. He volunteers and coaches high school-level football kickers from Buena to currently Rio Mesa High School. He also coaches Freshman Basketball. The kids love him and he loves coaching.

“For all the times Ron has been in and out of hospitals, months at a time in some instances, and even the times we thought we were saying our final ‘goodbyes’ to him, he has never once felt sorry for himself or complained about one of the million things he could complain about.”

Having a hold on my attention, and my heart, Chuck then added my favorite Wooden-ism to try and seal the deal: “Ron just goes about Making Every Day His Masterpiece.

“My request, if possible,” Ron concludes, finally getting to The Big Ask, “is we are celebrating his Big 60 with a big celebration for him on Saturday, December 26th. If you could give him a birthday shout-out in your column that Saturday, he would love it! If you can’t, I understand.

“Thanks for your time,

“Chuck Herrera”

Well, Chuck, I obviously cannot wish your brother Ron a birthday shout-out in print today. It would simply set a bad precedent.

I mean, if I granted your request the next thing I know every remarkable person kicking Spina Bifida’s butt for six decades and serving as an inspiration and role model for the rest of us on how to slam dunk self-pity and instead Make Each Day Our Masterpiece, no matter the challenges we face, would all want me to do the same for them.

There are just so many important things I should write about in my column. For instance, “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” which is all everyone is talking about these days. I really should offer my two-cent review.

Or perhaps share my New Year’s resolutions or predictions for 2016. And, of course, there’s always El Nino to write about as well as the verbal El Nino known as Donald Trump. And on and on.

So, Chuck, thanks for your letter but I just can’t honor your request. Sorry. I hope you understand. Maybe next year I can find a small space in my column to offer a “Happy Birthday, Ron!” shout-out.

Sincerely,

Woody

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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”

 

Top-shelf Books from 2015

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s new book STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter is available for Pre-Order HERE NOW! In time for the holidays!

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Turning the Pages Through 2015

Good things, sometimes, must come to an end. After doing an annual column for the past six years recommending some of my favorite books, I was of the mind to end the tradition – or at least take a hiatus.

The short reason was that my reading list was too short on this trip around the sun. My yearly goal is to read 52 books, but I fell far shy of averaging one a week in 2015. My tally to date, in fact, is only 29. Writing a new book, it seems, interferes greatly with reading them.

Catching up with Drew Daywalt, author of "The Day the Crayons Quit" and "The Day the Crayons Came Home."

Catching up with Drew Daywalt, author of “The Day the Crayons Quit” and “The Day the Crayons Came Home.”

But I changed my mind the other day when I was in a bookstore picking up a copy of “The Day the Crayons Came Home” as a gift. A woman recognized me – and also said I was much taller in person than my column picture suggests, although I have no idea how a tiny mug shot can suggest height one way or the other – and asked when I was going to share my annual book recommendations.

When I answered I was passing on the book column this year, she begged me to reconsider. I did. Here goes.

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 I will begin with none other than “The Day the Crayons Came Home” by my friend and Oak Park resident, Drew Daywalt. (Which means I am also recommending Drew’s debut children’s book, “The Day the Crayons Quit.”)

As with the best of children’s literature, one need not be a kid to enjoy these two mega-award winners – the first is even being made into a big-budget movie. So pick up a copy of each for a child you know – but read them yourself first!

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Another surprise recommendation is a YA – Young Adult – novel.

“All the Bright Places” is also written by a friend of mine, Jennifer Niven, and has won a wheelbarrow full of 2015 honors – and is also being made into a movie, starring Elle Flanning.

Despite being YA, “All the Bright Places” is dark and gritty and mysterious enough to captivate OA – Older Adult – readers.

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After reading John L. Parker’s newest novel, “Racing the Rain,” I felt compelled to re-read the other two books in the trilogy about Quenton Cassidy: “Once a Runner” and “Again To Carthage.”

“Racing the Rain” is the prequel to “Once a Runner,” which was originally published in paperback in 1978 in such limited numbers that its cult following caused tattered copies to sell for $200 and higher on eBay until it was finally reprinted in hardcover in 2010.

Reading the entire story in chronological order – “Again to Carthage” was the second to come out, but is the finale – enriched all three.

By the way, one need not be a runner to enjoy Parker’s storytelling because Cassidy’s running quest is a metaphor for the journey of life.

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“The Yosemite” by John Muir. Enough said.

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David McCullough again makes my top shelf, as the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner does pretty much any year he comes out with a new historical gem, this time with “The Wright Brothers.”

The most obvious, accurate and shortest blurb to describe this latest effort is: “ ‘The Wright Brothers’ soars!”

My enjoyment of this text was enriched by seeing McCullough give a talk in Santa Barbara about the Wright Brothers.

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Similarly, I read “I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban” after seeing the Nobel Peace Prize’s youngest-ever winner – at age 17 – speak at the Arlington Theatre this summer.

Rest assured, her story is equally inspiring on the written page as over a microphone.

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After beginning this column with a couple friends, it seems fitting to end with one more.

Recommended to me by my pal Clint Garman, who as a pastor and owner of Garman’s Restaurant & Irish Pub in Santa Paula is an expert on both topics covered in the pages, “The Search for God and Guinness: A Biography of the Beer that Changed the World” by Stephen Mansfield was as enjoyably rich in education as a pint of “the good stuff” is rich in flavor.

Cheers! And happy reading in 2016.

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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”