I Wish a Buck Were Still Silver: Moral Hazards, or Merle Haggard?

I generally watch the news between 5-6 P.M. but never seem to watch to the end, because NBC, CBS, FOX and CNN usually drift into the moral hazards bothering the rich, the powerful and politically protested.

I feel the need to shower after watching and reading the news.

Last night, it was very different.  I went to Catholic high high school wrestling, instead of watching preening dopes and oleaginous creeps parse tweets and tweak the turpitudes of turds in the political punch bowl.

I am no longer affected by the repellant Garrison Keillor, Matt Lauer, Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Senator Al Franken, Judge Roy Moore, or the cavalcade of clowns occupying public office in Illinois.

I watched more than three hours of high school school wrestling and feel 100% morally clean, renewed, energetic and ready for the brand new day.

I watched Brother Rice High School, Loyola Academy and Leo High School grapple-ers hit the mats from 5: 30 P.M. to shortly before 9: P.M. in a  controlled violence ballet in which each combatant gave his all until a quicker man with better lock-up pinned two shoulder blades, or garnered more points with escapes and near-falls until the clock ran out.

Not a second of shame in over three hours and not a whine from anyone. The victorious raised hand was shaken by the loser and both young men applauded vigorously by the crowd. I went home and listened to Merle Haggard's "Are The Good Times Really Gone?"



I prepared my classes on Christian Morality and the Old Testament and wondered about  things -

Wish a buck was still silver.
It was, back when the country was strong.
Back before Elvis; before the Vietnam war came along.
Before The Beatles and "Yesterday",
When a man could still work, and still would.
Is the best of the free life behind us now?
Are the good times really over for good?
Are we rolling down hill like a snowball headed for hell?
With no kind of chance for the Flag or the Liberty bell.
Wish a Ford and a Chevy,
Could still last ten years, like they should.
Is the best of the free life behind us now?
Are the good times really over for good?

I don't think so Merle, just different - sloppier, sillier, sissy-er, maybe, but wrestlers compete and hug their moms after a pin or a pinning and sheepishly glance to see if Dad's eyes shine a bit moister than usual.

Black, White Mexican, Arab and Filipino kids who had spit in cups and nodded off in class due to trying to 'cut weight' came alive for three minutes in a husky three hours.

No one was rolling to hell last night, Merle.