Students, parents, and teachers visited a local arboretum.
Every year since 1970, April 22 has been observed as Earth Day. It’s a day to recognize humankind’s responsibility to respect the planet on which we all live.
The marking of this day found 20 million Americans striving for cleaner air, water and conservation of the land and its natural resources. The movement eventually led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and the passage of several U.S. environmental laws.
In 1990, Earth Day went global, with 200 million people in 141 countries coordinating to improve the environment in their various locales. It lifted environmental issues onto the world stage.
So, here we are 53 years later, still striving to care for our precious planet. What plans do you have to commemorate Earth Day?
Just a few of the free-range Common Grackles in my front yard.
I don’t know about you, but the Common Grackles have taken over my birdfeeders and birdbaths. If you are interested, I’d gladly sell you a few or all of them.
Of course, you know I’m kidding. I couldn’t resist since April 1 is better known in the U.S. as April Fools Day. When I was a principal, the students loved to fool me on April 1 with all means of shenanigans. I was always glad when April 1 came on the weekend, like today.
So, April Fools Day! And in case you are interested in the grackles, please contact me a.s.a.p.
We laughed at a Covid-looking Christmas ornament. I am not laughing anymore.
I finally got it. I’m no longer a Covid-19 virgin. Since its known arrival in the U.S. in early 2020, I have fought the good fight to avoid getting this dreaded disease.
I followed the latest developments and the daily charts on cases and deaths. The grim statistics gave me pause and determination not to get this novel contagion. I was elated when Covid-19 vaccines became available. I got all the shots, including the latest boosters.
My wife and I were cautious in every way. We masked whenever we went into public indoor places and avoided crowds. We washed our hands thoroughly and frequently. Last year, we traveled in several states and Europe, flew on airplanes, rode buses, attended outdoor concerts, and made it through unscathed. While others succumbed, we persevered. I thought I was staying ahead of the Covid game.
Before our annual wintering in Florida, we enjoyed the holidays with family and friends, always careful about masking and following the other suggested guidelines. We were excited about spending nearly six weeks in the sunshine state until we weren’t.
Without boring you with the ugly details, here’s an outline of the sequence of events that spoiled our Florida island winter stay:
On January 19, I woke with severe lower back pain after sleeping on a too-soft mattress in our rented condo.
Four days later, I visited an express care facility and received a shot and pain meds.
With no noticeable relief, I returned to express care days later. My meds were changed, and I had an MRI the next day.
The MRI showed multiple issues with my spine and discs, and an epidural was scheduled.
On the morning I was to receive the epidural, I had a gastrointestinal (GI) bleed. That led to another two days in a hospital.
Three days later, a fellow snowbird friend from Ohio was struck and killed by a motorcycle going 75 mph in a 35 mph zone. All alone, his poor wife called us. She was hysterical with grief. We were the only people she knew on the island. We comforted her as best we could until her two adult sons arrived via air later that night. We were all heartbroken.
Of course, they had to make all the complex arrangements and fill out legal forms for the authorities before returning to Ohio. The sons packed up their parents’ things so they could leave in a couple of days.
The day after they left, I finally got my epidural. I had immediate relief from the intense pain. However, I still had to make the 12-hour drive home to Virginia, with an overnight stop in North Carolina.
We arrived home and unpacked, and by the weekend, I was feeling much better, but I continued to grieve the loss of my friend. I couldn’t erase the horror of the accident from my mind.
Little did I know that with my mental and physical reserves at rock bottom, Covid-19 would sneak its ugly symptoms into my body. But that is precisely what happened.
After a meeting with a friend over coffee to talk about all that had happened to me, I returned home not feeling the best. I was stuffy and had a sore throat.
I took a home Covid-19 test. It was positive, but I wondered if I had done it correctly. So, I took another with the same results. Now I could physically identify with the millions of global people who had it. But it would get worse before it got better.
Just when I thought my emotions couldn’t sink any lower, they did. I called my friend and told him I had Covid-19. He agreed to call another friend we had seen at the cafe, and I notified others with whom I had had recent contact.
I texted my wife, who was volunteering at a local thrift store. I was very discouraged but knew we needed to make a plan to keep her from getting the virus. I claimed our bedroom with a bath, and my wife functioned in the rest of the house. I knew how much she cared when she dragged my recliner to the bedroom door. It was much more relaxing to sit in than the bed.
I called my primary care provider to see about getting Paxlovid, given to seniors testing positive for Covid-19 and who have compromised immune systems. After all that I had been through, mine certainly was.
A telemed conference was arranged with my doctor the next day. She told me to isolate for five days and then mask and social distance for another five. My wife picked up the Paxlovid and a nasal spray the pharmacist recommended.
By that time, most of the noted symptoms of this pandemic disease had introduced themselves to my body. I was exhausted and achy, and yet chilled. I had an unproductive cough, which soon gave me a headache. Plus, my blood pressure was high again. In short, I was miserable.
I took the Paxlovid as directed, and I could feel it begin to work its slow magic in my weakened state. I slept a lot and had very vivid dreams.
I texted my wife if I needed anything, and she texted me when she needed to leave the house. She brought me food, drink, and snacks. I married an angel.
I kept drinking fluids to stay hydrated and ate lots of fresh and dried fruits, eggs, and nuts for protein. But the virus hung on, and I adjusted my intake accordingly as my symptoms changed daily. As much as I had read and heard about Covid-19, that aspect caught me off-guard.
Listening to other Covid victims, I knew the cough and stuffiness would linger. I didn’t expect, however, that the virus would attack my already quixotic intestinal tract. I have difficulty keeping that in line without invisible pandemic infestations complicating my regularity. That’s all the details I’ll offer.
Consequently, I’m still working on recovering. The five-and-five formula offered by my doctor didn’t fit my situation. I isolated myself for a week and still tested positive.
I don’t know how long it will take for me to get back to my established daily routine. Given all I’ve been through, I’m unsure what that is anymore.
This 75-year-old body now knows the depths of the effects of this inconvenient, indiscriminate, horrible disease. Those effects can’t be shown on any medical chart.
I had to wonder, when I saw this on the side of a panel truck, what happened to Mel? Was he bought out of the company? Did he move? Was he fired? Did he walk the plank?
Whatever happened and wherever Mel is, Happy April Fools Day!
I was sitting one recent morning at my desk that faces the Atlantic Ocean when I noticed a sailboat passing by at least a half-mile offshore. When I went to take a photo of it, I spotted something else in the water. I snapped a picture, ensuring I got both the boat and the unknown object in the frame.
I switched to my binoculars and couldn’t believe my eyes. The long dark object appeared to be a whale. The morning sunshine reflected off of its face. I had never seen a Right Whale before, but I was pretty sure that’s what it was. I took a couple more shots and then Googled the phone number to report the sighting.
Earlier, I had noticed a red and white airplane circling over the ocean just to the north of our rented condo. As I found the number, I put two and two together. Because they are an endangered species, most Right Whales are tracked by various science organizations, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. I figured the plane must have been verifying the whale’s presence.
Because Right Whales are protected, the public is asked to notify authorities of any sightings. Right Whales migrate more than 1,000 miles south from the Canadian and New England coasts to warmer waters off the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida’s east coast. It is there that they calf their young.
Scientists estimate that less than 400 Right Whales still exist. Protecting them and their young is critical to the whale’s survival. Consequently, the requests to report their sightings.
My call went to voicemail at the North Atlantic Right Whale Project, a Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission division. It wasn’t long before I received a call back from one of their agents asking when and where I had seen the whale. When I told the person that a red and white plane had drawn my attention, enabling me to spot the whale, I was told it was one of the project’s aircraft.
The agent told me that what I saw was actually a mother and her calf and asked me to send my photos to them to help support the plane’s sighting. I gladly cooperated.
I looked closer at my photos. I could see two separate facial reflections, one large and another much smaller. I was ecstatic. The images aren’t top quality since the whales were a half-mile from me. I was glad for the sighting and more than happy to help identify this Right Whale mother and her baby.
Sunset in Shenandoah National Park. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh.
I’m glad 2021 has ended. We would all like to forget it for a million reasons. Likely, we never will, nor should we.
With politics and the coronavirus and its variants making up much of the headline news, I did my usual thing and kept track of some of the more quirky but still significant information.
Here are just a few of the newsy pieces that didn’t make the headlines or the TV news.
January 1 – The National Interagency Fire Center reported that U.S. wildfires burned 10,275,000 acres, the most ever recorded.
January 7 – Tesla CEO Elon Musk became the wealthiest person globally with a net worth of $185 billion, surpassing Jeff Bezos’s paltry $184 billion.
January 8 – A Missouri woman who married a 93-year-old Civil War Veteran when she was 17 died as the last remaining widow of the war.
January 9 – The state fire marshal announced that no child died in a fire in Massachusetts for the first time since officials kept records.
January 15 – A racing pigeon that disappeared from Oregon in October 2020 reappeared in Melbourne, Australia, where officials tried to catch and kill it due to Australia’s strict quarantine rules.
January 18 – D.C. National Guard Sgt. Jacob Kohut, a band teacher, taught students from his Humvee before a 12-hour shift to guard the Capitol Building.
January 25 – A new study showed that the earth is losing 1.2 trillion tons of ice per year through melting glaciers and polar ice caps.
Glaciers globally are melting at rapid rates.
January 26 – Stranded in a snowstorm near Hayes Hill, Oregon, Jefferson County Public Health staff administered doses of the COVID-19 vaccine that were about to expire to motorists who were also stuck.
February 12 – The U.S. had its deadliest week in a century for avalanche deaths when 15 skiers died between January 26 and February 6.
February 16 – Fran Goldman, 90, was so determined to get her first coronavirus vaccine after struggling to get an appointment that she walked six miles round-trip in a foot of snow in Seattle.
February 17 – Houston’s Gallery Furniture opened two stores to shelter people from the cold and snow after power and water supplies were lost all across Texas.
March 3 – The California Highway Patrol in Los Angeles caught a driver in the carpool lane with a realistic-looking passenger dummy wearing a face mask and a Cleveland Indians baseball hat.
March 8 – The sun shining through a crystal ball in the living room of a Delton, Wisconsin home caused a $250,000 fire.
March 9 – Shoe Zone, a foot ware retailer in Great Britain, announced that Terry Boot had replaced Peter Foot as the company’s financial boss.
March 11 – A digital artist known as Beeple sold a collage jpg image at a Christie’s auction for $69.3 million.
March 16 – Despite being closed for six weeks during the pandemic, a record 1.7 million people visited Shenandoah National Park, Luray, Virginia, in 2020.
March 19 – Iceland’s Fagradalsfjall volcano erupted for the first time in 800 years.
March 23 – Officials blamed high winds from a dust storm for the grounding of Ever Given, one of the world’s largest container ships, to be blown sideways, blocking the Suez Canal and closing the busy shipping route.
April 8 – Archeologists in Egypt announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old lost golden city unearthed near the city of Luxor.
April 8 – On his second shot on the seventh hole of the Masters Golf Tournament in Augusta, Georgia, professional golfer Rory McIlroy hit his spectator father with the golf ball.
April 12 – Hope Trautwine pitched a perfect game for the University of North Texas softball team by striking out all 21 batters from Arkansas Pine Bluff.
April 14 – A report in “Nature Communications” revealed that archeologists had unearthed 3,500-year-old terracotta honey pots in central Nigeria.
April 28 – Walmart restarted its pandemic delayed experiment of online ordering of groceries and having one of their employees not only deliver it to your home but also stock your shelves and refrigerator.
May 8 – Spencer Silver, the research chemist at 3M who invented the Post-It Note, died at age 80 at his home in St. Paul, Minnesota.
May 11 – A skull-head painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat sold at auction at Christie’s in New York City for $93.1 million.
May 20 – Research from Minderoo found that the average American throws away 110 pounds of plastic annually.
June 3 – Italian artist Salvatore Garau sold an invisible sculpture at auction for $18,300.
June 5 – A study revealed that, on average, Americans touch their smartphone 2,617 times per day.
June 9 – National Geographic officially recognized the body of water around Antarctica as the world’s fifth ocean, the Southern Ocean.
June 23 – A herd of 30 cows escaped from a slaughterhouse in Pico Rivera, California, and were later corralled in a cul-de-sac by police, although deputies shot one cow.
It’s not a herd, but it definitely is loose. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh.
June 28 – The New York Yankees, the team I love to hate, made Gwen Goldman’s 60-year-old dream come true by making her the team’s honorary batgirl for a game.
June 28 – Ankeny, Iowa, police arrested 42-year-old Robert Gollwitzer, Jr. for phoning in a bomb threat to a local McDonald’s restaurant because employees forgot to include dipping sauce for his chicken McNuggets.
July 8 – Zaita Avant-garde, a 14-year-old from New Orleans, became the first African-American to win the National Spelling Bee contest in Washington, D.C.
July 10 – Death Valley, California, the temperature hit a world-record high of 135 degrees Fahrenheit.
July 12 – The Copernicus Climate Exchange Center reported that June was the hottest on record in North America.
July 13 – Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission reported that 841 manatees had died between January 1 and July 2, more than any other time in the state’s history.
July 22 – The United Arab Emirates used technologies, including drones, to stimulate clouds to produce rain to counter 120 temperatures and low potable water sources.
August 6 – An unopened Super Mario Brothers video game sold for $2 million at auction.
August 10 – NASA satellite photos showed for the first time in recorded history smoke from wildfires burning in Siberia reached the North Pole.
August 12 – According to the 2020 U.S. Census, the number of White people fell for the first time since 1790.
August 13 – The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said July 2021 was the hottest on record, 1.67 degrees Fahrenheit above the 20th -century average.
Amish children sledding. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh.
September 9 – France fast-tracked 12,000 frontline COVID-19 workers to citizenship for their valiant ongoing efforts to help those in need.
September 12 – Lawrence Brooks of New Orleans, Louisiana, turned 112, the oldest surviving World War II veteran. (Sadly, Mr. Brooks died January 5, 2022).
September 13 – The governor of Massachusetts mobilized 250 National Guard members to serve as school bus drivers since the state’s schools were short on employed drivers.
September 16 – Tobacco giant Philip Morris purchased Vectura, a British company that manufactures inhalers.
September 17 – Alabama’s Health Officer, Scott Harris, said that for the first time in known history, the state had more deaths than births in 2020.
September 20 – The Guinness Book of World Records named the paint developed by researchers at Purdue University as the world’s whitest.
October 4 – A Brazilian soccer player was arrested for attempted murder after kicking a referee in the head during a match.
October 16 – Elon Musk became the world’s richest person when the company’s stock soared, and his net worth grew to $209.4 billion.
October 21 – Timber the Moose, a wooden marketing sign for the Cabin Store in Mt. Hope, Ohio, got its stolen head returned by an Amish youngster who found it in a field 10 miles away.
A real bull moose in Denali National Park.
October 25 – Hertz announced that it had ordered 100,000 Tesla electric cars for its rental inventory.
October 26 – A hiker in Colorado got lost but refused to answer his cell phone because he didn’t recognize the search and rescue team’s number.
November 4 – Colin Craig-Brown of Hamilton, New Zealand, dug up what may be the world’s largest potato that weighed 17.2 pounds from his garden.
November 5 – Billy Coppersmith, a Maine lobsterman, caught a one-in-100 million blue “cotton candy” lobster and donated it to an aquarium in New Hampshire.
November 16 – Psychologists in London revealed a study showed that the perfect hug should last between five and 10 seconds.
November 24 – Roto-Rooter said that plumbers refer to the Friday after Thanksgiving Day as Brown Friday because it’s the busiest day of the year for plumbers.
December 4 – The National Weather Service issued a Blizzard Warning for the summit of Mauna Kea volcano in Hawaii.
December 7 – A report stated that turf grass is now the biggest plant crop in the U.S., collectively covering an area larger than Wisconsin.
December 9 – Davyon Johnson, 11, of Muskogee, Oklahoma, saved a fellow student from choking using the Heimlich maneuver and saved an older woman from her burning house later in the afternoon.
December 11 – The Oxford Dictionary named “vax” its word of the year for 2021.
December 26 – Kodiak, Alaska hit a record high of 67 degrees, giving the term “baked Alaska” a new meaning.
Welcome to autumn for those of us who live in the Northern Hemisphere. Today is the Autumnal Equinox, where summer rolls into fall without much autumnal fanfare.
I took this photo during a partial solar eclipse. I was standing atop a hill near Charm, Ohio, in the heart of Ohio’s Amish country in late October 2014. The eclipse occurred close to sunset, which created an eerie glow in the air. If you click on the photo to get a closer look, you can see that the sun’s rays made tiny rainbows in the hundreds of spider webs blown straight out from the barbed wire fence by a strong westerly wind. The coloration of the leaves in the background accentuate the fact that fall had indeed arrived.
Major League Baseball is back! I should be excited as that exclamation point, but I’m not.
This year I’m a bit ambivalent about the baseball season beginning. The pandemic heads the hesitancy list, but other dynamics come into play, too.
Baseball has always been my favorite sport. It’s in my DNA, going back to my father’s father.
Now, our oldest grandson is headlong into the game, too. I couldn’t be prouder. Nana and I attended as many pre-pandemic games as possible. We’re hopeful that we can watch his high school games this spring. If not, then we’ll aim to follow his summer traveling league team.
Our grandson takes his pitching seriously.
I still love the game, or I wouldn’t have bought the MLB package on my satellite TV subscription. I watched parts of several games on Opening Day, April 1, including the Cleveland Indians’ loss to the Detroit Tigers.
Given all of the goofy stuff that happened, April 1 turned out to be the most appropriate day to start the season. Cleveland’s Shane Bieber struck out 12 Tiger batters and still lost the game. Snow squalls peppered the first few innings of the contest.
In Colorado, the Dodgers’ Cody Bellinger hit a home run with Justin Turner on first. However, he only got credit for a single and was called out when Turner, thinking the outfielder caught the ball, retreated past Bellinger to first base. Bellinger got credit for a single, scoring Turner, but was called out for passing his teammate on the base path.
Rain canceled the Baltimore at Boston game, while the league postponed the entire opening series between the Mets and Nationals due to players testing positive for the coronavirus. I’m fearful that was a pitch high and tight to the rest of the season.
Young superstar Francisco Lindor recently “agreed” to a 10-year contract extension with the New York Mets for $341 million. And people wondered why Cleveland traded him.
I’m exceedingly glad for Frankie, but should any player make that much money for playing a kid’s game? The Mets think so.
Opening Day in baseball is a big deal. Most home openers conditionally “sold out” since most major league clubs limited attendance to allow for proper physical distancing due to the pandemic. The Texas Rangers weren’t one of them. Real fans filled the entire 40,300 seat stadium. Can you say “super-spreader?”
It’s great to have actual human beings in attendance watching and cheering for their favorite teams. It sure beats looking at those life-size cardboard cutouts of people that populated seats in last year’s shortened season. Still, health safeguards should prevail.
Besides the pandemic precautions, even politics has negatively influenced the game. MLB pulled the All-Star Game scheduled for Atlanta this summer and moved it to Denver, Colorado. The baseball commissioner cited the voter suppression laws recently approved in Georgia.
Perhaps my less than enthusiastic response to professional baseball’s return is proof of my evolving senility. I hope that’s not the case.
I remember taking my son to a New York Mets game 11 days after the September 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center. It was the start of filing through metal detectors to enter ballgames, but once in, it was back to hot dogs, peanuts, and Cracker Jacks while watching baseball.
Now 20 years later, the world is in another tough spot with the pandemic. Even baseball’s return doesn’t stir me. A balm is needed over Gilead and baseball, too.
Maybe if my favorite team wins the World Series, I’ll perk up. It’s a very long shot, but the world needs a blessed miracle right now.
Patience is a virtue. The exact origin of that proverb is hard to determine but about as straightforward in its meaning as can be.
In “Piers Plowman,” William Langland wrote about a man searching for faith in the 14th century. This work marked one of the earliest references to patience. A line in the poem reads, “patience is a fair virtue.”
What does that mean exactly? To me, it says that instead of rushing ahead on our own, we should pay attention to what is actually happening, no matter how weird or repulsive it may seem. The coronavirus fits that description.
In this case, patience requires us to depend on those who deal with such anomalies daily. Scientists, doctors, and researchers all belong in that category.
Throughout the pandemic, vigilance remains required. We continue to need to wear masks when we go out or visit others. We also need to keep our social distance and wash our hands. Those were and continue to be simple instructions that I embraced because they benefited others besides me.
Still, practicing patience is hard to do. The ongoing pandemic is proof positive.
Impatient people bolted ahead, behaving as if everything was as it had been in the world, when in fact, it wasn’t. Refusing to wear a mask, physically distance, or alter daily routines has prolonged the virus’s life.
Consequently, the pandemic is also a teacher, and we all are in the same classroom. Some pupils listen and learn, while others misbehave or fall asleep.
The pandemic has taught us a lot about people and their willingness to accept scientific facts, the reality of a new disease and the unknown, and realize the consequences of an infection run rampant.
It’s important to note that being patient has its benefits. The pandemic forced me to slow down, relax, notice, care, and listen. Since we were together even more than usual, my wife and I gave each other expanded personal space and time than we had previously.
First pitch of the 2016 World Series, Cubs vs. Indians.
It’s not like I didn’t know patience before the pandemic. After all, the Cleveland Indians are my favorite sports team. It’s been 73 years since they last won the World Series. If following that team doesn’t require patience, I don’t know what does. I learned early on the mantra of “wait until next year.”
Well, it’s next year. A new baseball season is upon us. Perhaps this is Cleveland’s year. Only time will tell. Like enduring the pandemic, patience will be an essential virtue with this team and every aspect of life.
Patience requires us to stop, breathe, observe, sense, and move slowly. Patience is and will continue to be essential for mental, physical, and spiritual survival during the pandemic.
Ephesians 4:2 reads: “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.” I learned that it’s critical to apply that to myself, too. I realized that it was okay to feel down with all that the pandemic brought and about activities that we couldn’t do, especially with those we love.
Patience modeled.
We have waited patiently for an effective vaccine, and now it is here. People are receiving inoculations against this deadly virus. Still, we will continue to follow the crucial guidelines of wearing a mask, physical distancing, and washing our hands for 20 seconds or more. As Yogi Berra famously mumbled, “It ain’t over until it’s over.”
Patience became the watchword of the pandemic. It will continue to persevere until we all work together to conquer this unwanted virus. That will prove patience a valuable and vital virtue, indeed.
Roadkill Crossing 
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