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Readers Fill In For
“Sobsmacked” Columnist
I planned to take a stroll down Nostalgia Lane today with a column about the Ventura County Fair, which concludes its 144th edition on Sunday, but Dayton and El Paso on the heels of Gilroy made me feel an obligation to write yet again about the gun-fueled cancer that is killing America.
But I have no new thoughts, only my same old rage. Feeling sobsmacked – my word for being gobsmacked to tears – I instead will turn this space over to some emails from my readers.
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“I liked your perfect games column with the 1956 Don Larson World Series no hitter and first moon landing correlation,” wrote Alex Jannone. “I listened to one (Larson) and watched the other.
“With the final out approaching, as a wash-up boy I was washing up old Potter printing presses with benzene and no gloves – benzene and inks with chromate not only thickens your fingers and hands, but your mind too – in the downtown NY printing district at Canal and Hudson streets. Silence, then a roar from the mixed bag of Yankee and Dodger fan listeners as some other presses stopped to listen.
“With the first moon landing 1969, I was comfortably watching in my living room with my wife and small children in Commack, Long Island. Nice memories to bring back.”
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“ ‘Gobsmacked’ – now there’s a word we don’t often see/read and much less hear!” Rick Throckmorton began, quoting in extreme brief from my column sharing a tall tale about a talking dog told to me by Starr Thompson.
“I, too, have the immense pleasure of knowing Starr. We are members of the ‘Quiet Birdmen’, a national aviation group with roots to post-WWI.
“Starr, certainly a member of The Greatest Generation, is quite the story teller. I’m proud to know him!”
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Bill Waxman poignantly found new words that I could not about America’s mass shootings, sending me his poem titled “Only in America”:
“And today we awoke to the familiar refrain / Of families reeling in their grief and their pain
“Dozens of lives the gunmen have claimed / While our leaders scramble for someone to blame
“Statements are issued, just more prayers and thoughts / That get lost in the nightmarish echo of gunshots
“Once again, there will be no action taken / To prevent the horror of El Paso and Dayton
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“There is now no safe place to go / Malls and churches, a cool movie show
“Outdoor concerts, and yes, too, our schools / Our numbness to violence has rendered us fools
“There’s no common ground for common sense / There’s no leadership coming from Trump and Pence
“Time alone won’t correct the aberration / Of the terror that stalked El Paso and Dayton
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“What if every elected official / Simply did what they know to be beneficial
“What if every one of them all across the nation / Simply said no to NRA political donation
“What if they all simply took a stand / To ensure that all assault weapons were banned
“Maybe then our collective conscience would awaken / To the needless carnage in El Paso and Dayton
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“From Gilroy to Parkland, from Sebring to Vegas / The political will to do something evades us
“From Aurora to Penn State, we’re at a loss for an answer / And we sit back and ignore this fast spreading cancer
“We wring our hands, we continue to be vexed / We don’t believe that we might be next
“Until the next time, when we see we’re mistaken / We learned not the lessons from El Paso and Dayton.”
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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.
Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …
- Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com