Opinion

Lisa and I left another small flag next to my grandfather’s headstone before we walked back to our car and drove back to North Little Rock to return to our weekend fun. Visiting the cemetery was a bittersweet experience — a stark reminder of how much I miss the people who helped shape me but a reminder, too, of how fortunate I was to have them and how blessed I am to carry their memories in my heart.

Ifelt more than a twinge of sympathy for local students and educators a couple of weeks ago when their spring break coincided with several days of rainy, cold weather. I’m not a fan of the cold.

She could not help it, could not stop sending text messages, making phone calls. Thank Heaven for cell phones, she thought; their conventional, old-fashioned, wireline phone had minutes ago stopped offering a dial tone. Please, let the cell towers keep functioning. The cable television signal was as yet uninterrupted. They are at their best, the TV weather people, when the weather is its worst.

If you read this column even occasionally, you’re likely familiar with my thoughts on the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act. Arkansas’ public-records law is one of the strongest in the nation and it’s an important tool not just for journalists but also for citizens who want to know what their government is doing.

It was our best spring break ever. No classes, but we learned so much. The oldest grand, a ripe old 25 and newly (and thus far happily) married and master’s-degreed magna cum laude, enjoyed her last spring break a couple years ago. Except not; she now spends those precious days helping people younger than she, most of them female, assess what they plan to do after the respite ends; that is, what they plan to do with the rest of their lives. Counseling, after a fashion, while using a golf course as a chalkboard and a putter as a pointer. Adulthood: It’s closer than they think, she tells them; she, who is in the first third of her wonderful life. And, Heaven Bless, she made time for her grandparents, stopping off to share with them the advice she was passing along to her charges, which amounted to a refresher course for her elders. She was telling them that education was paramount, that they could learn about some things in life, as she had, on the fairway, but that other lessons could only be learned in the classroom. So they absolutely had to put their textbook education first.