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A little exercise in paremiology

Local Columns

Proverbs — little statements of wisdom — fascinate me. Proverbs are cultural truth handed down from one generation to another over hundreds, even thousands, of years. There’s actually a body of study involving proverbs and it’s called paremiology. I’m not a paremiologist; I just enjoy discovering new proverbs and am fascinated by how the truth of proverbs transcends ethnic, national and cultural lines. A proverb from Africa, Scandinavia or Latin America, properly translated, conveys wisdom understood universally. Did your mother ever tell you to just be yourself? There are ...

‘I am going to keep asking questions’

Local Columns

Friday morning I woke early to a text from a close friend. Two women had been murdered Thursday night at Cornerstone Church in Ames, in the mega-church’s parking lot. My youngest daughter was involved in youth group at Cornerstone, years ago. Since then, she has been through more than one violent relationship. The shooting took me back to a dark place. This was personal. The shootings happened in my hometown. Where I ought to feel safe. I don’t feel safe. I feel angry. I grew up in Ames, went to school here, went to church here, fell in love here, got married here, went to ...

About those AR-15s

Local Columns

After reading some of the recent round of stories about the final passage of Senate File 581, I’m pretty embarrassed. As a reporter, you’re supposed to tell the reader what happened, who it happened to, how it happened, where it happened and, if known, why it happened. I’m anold school ...

Remember?

Local Columns

There was a time when cigarettes were everywhere. Remember? They were in vending machines, in newspaper and magazine ads. Movie stars portrayed them as sexy. Remember the photo of Hayley Mills' dad in the original The Parent Trap? The one where Brian Keith is posed in a moody black and white, holding a smoking cigarette? Then it finally sank in that cigarettes were killing us. Remember? Remember the cancer statistics that finally got our attention, not just because they were big numbers but because those big numbers swallowed our loved ones? Remember the emphysema? When nonsmoking ...

The best buddy a guy could ask for

Local Columns

Another Memorial Day had come and gone. John attended the community Memorial Day service at the local cemetery Monday morning but melancholy gnawed at his soul in the days which followed. On his way into town for a tractor part on Thursday morning, John felt an inexplicable urge to stop by the well-groomed cemetery again and visit the grave of an old high school buddy. Parking his pickup truck a few yards uphill from the grave, John stepped down from the cab and walked slowly to the granite stone. At the grave he carefully lowered himself to the grass and set upright a plant ...

Why, and How to, Vote in Iowa’s June 7 Primary Election

Local Columns

While many area state legislative races are uncontested, there are two statewide primary races for Democrats, and one for Republicans. Three Democrats and one Republican are running in the primary to determine who will challenge long-term U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley, of New Hartford, in the ...