We carry pieces of the people who have traveled through our lives — their lessons, laughter, kindness, and even their little habits. This morning’s coffee is about remembering what others left with us and considering what we might leave behind for someone else.
Before the telephone rings, before the television begins telling us what happened overnight, and before the world starts asking something from us, there are those few quiet moments when we can simply sit and think.
I have come to believe those moments are more valuable than we realize.
We spend much of our lives collecting things. Not necessarily possessions, but memories, lessons, sayings, habits, friendships, disappointments, victories, and even a few regrets.
Some of them we carry without realizing it.
A phrase our father used to say.
Something our mother taught us without ever sitting us down and calling it a lesson.
The way an old friend laughed.
A song that suddenly takes us back forty years.
The smell of coffee brewing in a kitchen that no longer exists.
Life has an interesting way of packing our suitcase for us.
By the time we reach a certain age, we discover that we are carrying pieces of nearly everyone who has traveled beside us.
And perhaps that is one of life’s greatest gifts.
People do not entirely leave us when they are gone.
They remain in the things they taught us, the stories we tell about them, the kindness they showed us, and sometimes even in those little irritating habits we swore we would never adopt — until one morning we catch ourselves doing exactly the same thing.
That is when you have to smile.
Because somehow, without noticing, yesterday has quietly found its way into today.
So as you enjoy your coffee this morning, think about the people who helped pack your suitcase.
Remember the ones who taught you something worthwhile.
And when the opportunity comes today, leave something good behind for someone else to carry.
A kind word.
A little patience.
A helping hand.
A good story.
Because years from now, when someone else is sitting quietly over their morning coffee, you just might be one of the memories that makes them smile.
And that wouldn’t be such a bad thing to leave behind.
Have a great day from benandsteve.com — and may there always be enough coffee for one more story.
Some of life’s most meaningful moments are the ones we barely notice while they are happening. This Morning Coffee is a reminder to appreciate the quiet, ordinary moments before they become the memories we miss most.
There are mornings when nothing remarkable happens.
The coffee brews. The house slowly wakes up. A dog stretches somewhere nearby. A car passes down the street. Maybe the sun finds its way through the blinds and lands across the floor in that familiar place it always seems to find.
Photo by Lucas Andrade on Pexels.comSomedays you need a cup. Somedays, you need two. And, somedays you need the whole damn pot!
Nothing extraordinary.
And yet, I have come to believe these may be some of the most important mornings we are given.
We spend so much of our lives waiting for something significant to happen. We look forward to birthdays, vacations, reunions, holidays, accomplishments and celebrations. We mark the big moments on calendars and take photographs so we will remember them.
But most of life happens somewhere in between.
It happens while we are standing at the kitchen counter waiting for the coffee to finish brewing.
It happens during the quiet conversation across the breakfast table.
It happens when someone asks, “Did you sleep okay?”
It happens when the dog follows you from one room to another for absolutely no reason other than the fact that wherever you are seems to be where he wants to be.
These moments rarely announce themselves as important.
There is no music playing in the background.
Nobody takes a photograph.
There is no ceremony.
And yet someday, these may be the moments we miss the most.
I think that is one of the lessons age quietly teaches us. The ordinary days we once hurried through eventually become the memories we would gladly revisit.
The sound of someone laughing in another room.
A familiar chair sitting beside the window.
A favorite coffee cup.
Someone calling your name from the other end of the house.
Things that once seemed ordinary somehow become treasures after enough years have passed.
Maybe that is why I have learned to appreciate mornings like this one.
There is coffee in the cup.
There are people I care about somewhere in this world.
There are memories behind me and, God willing, a few more waiting ahead.
And for the moment, nothing particularly remarkable is happening.
Which, when you think about it, is something rather remarkable itself.
So this morning, while you drink your coffee, take a look around.
There may be something happening right now that someday you will give almost anything to experience one more time.
Sometimes the best parts of life are the ones we almost failed to notice.
Have a great day from benandsteve.com — and remember, ordinary moments have a way of becoming extraordinary memories.
Sunday coffee has a way of slowing the world down. Sometimes the best thing we can do before another week begins is sit quietly, sip slowly, and remember how much there still is to be thankful for.
I don’t know that there is anything scientific behind that statement. The beans are the same. The water comes from the same faucet. The coffee pot certainly hasn’t learned what day of the week it is.
But somehow, Sunday morning coffee knows.
It knows there is no reason to rush.
The coffee pot can sit there on the counter and quietly do its job while the rest of the house slowly decides whether it is ready to join the day.
There are mornings when coffee is practically a piece of emergency equipment. You pour it while looking at the clock, searching for your keys, wondering where you left your glasses, and trying to remember whatever important thing you promised yourself the night before that you absolutely would not forget.
Sunday coffee doesn’t seem interested in any of that.
Sunday coffee says, Sit down.
The world will still be there in ten minutes.
Maybe that is one of the little gifts we have forgotten how to appreciate.
I often find myself reflecting on the Sundays of my childhood, especially those quiet early mornings when only my father and I were awake.
The test pattern had just disappeared from our black-and-white television, and the first program of the morning was the children’s show Davey and Goliath. It was followed by a gospel music program featuring the Florida Boys. I enjoyed both, although the second one was certainly aimed more toward my dad’s age group than mine.
When the gospel program ended, Dad would usually look at me and say, “Let’s go.”
Most Sundays, he already had a few sacks of groceries packed and ready to deliver around the southwest part of town, where much of Binger’s Black community lived. We had chickens—hundreds of them, at least it seemed that way to me as a child—along with cattle and pigs. My father shared what we had with people he believed truly needed it.
As we made those rounds, he would sometimes give me one of his little lessons.
“You don’t see a single one of them getting commodities at City Hall when they’re handing them out,” he would say. “Nope. It’s all these fine-to-do white people.”
There was always just a little preaching mixed into his words.
Even at that young age, I understood what he was showing me. I had already begun to recognize the hypocrisy he was talking about—the difference between what people said about others and what was actually taking place right in front of us.
Once our morning deliveries were finished, we would stop and buy the Sunday newspaper from the sidewalk vending machine. Dad would toss it into the pickup, and then we would head for the only café in town open on Sunday morning.
That was where Dad gathered what I now jokingly call his weekly community intelligence.
He listened.
He visited.
He heard who was doing what, who was upset with whom, whose crops were doing well, whose family was having trouble, and whatever else happened to be making its way through town that morning. Then, during the following week, he could use that information to maneuver his way through conversations in the barbershop.
And I had my own use for it.
Come Monday morning, I could walk onto the school playground and tell my classmates what I had heard their neighbors talking about over Sunday breakfast.
For a kid with a speech impediment, having a little inside information turned out to be a surprisingly useful way to keep a conversation going.
We spend so much of our lives preparing for the next thing that we sometimes fail to notice the thing we are living right now.
The coffee pot understands none of this, of course.
It simply sits there.
A little steam rises.
The kitchen begins to smell familiar.
A cup gets filled.
And for a few moments, nothing else is required of us.
There was a time when Sundays seemed almost designed around slowing down. Stores opened later. Families gathered for dinner. Church bells rang. Newspapers were thicker. People sat on porches longer.
Even the telephone seemed to understand that Sunday morning was not the appropriate time to cause trouble.
Today, the world rarely takes a day off.
Our phones buzz.
The news keeps moving.
Someone somewhere desperately wants us to know about a sale ending at midnight.
But the old coffee pot still offers the same invitation it always has.
Stay awhile.
Listen to the quiet.
Think about the people you love.
Remember the ones who once sat across the table from you.
Be thankful for those who still do.
And maybe leave a little room in your day for absolutely nothing important at all.
Because sometimes doing nothing important is exactly what the soul needs.
So this Sunday morning, pour another cup.
Let the coffee pot keep warm whatever is left behind.
And before you hurry into another week, give yourself permission to sit quietly with the life you already have.
It may not be perfect.
It may not always be easy.
But somewhere between the first sip and the bottom of the cup, you might discover there is still quite a bit worth being thankful for.
Have a wonderful Sunday from benandsteve.com — and may your coffee be hot, your morning be peaceful, and nobody ask you to do anything important until at least the second cup.
Coming home after a long journey does not always mean our hearts have caught up with us. Sometimes the ordinary things waiting at home—a cup of coffee, a familiar chair, a loved one nearby—remind us just how precious everyday life really is.
There is something strange about coming home after a long journey.
You walk through the same door. You set your things down in familiar places. The coffee pot is sitting where you left it. The dog seems perfectly satisfied that everyone has finally returned to where they belong.
Everything looks normal.
But somehow, you aren’t quite the same person who walked out that door.
Over the past several days, Steve and I traveled roads filled with memories. We saw family, visited familiar places, said goodbye to my mother in Oklahoma, and then pointed ourselves west and began the long journey home.
Now the suitcases are being emptied.
The laundry is finding its way into the washing machine.
The mail is being sorted.
The refrigerator is reminding us that apparently groceries do not magically restock themselves while you’re gone.
And slowly, ordinary life begins again.
But I’ve been thinking about something this morning.
Maybe ordinary life doesn’t really begin again.
Maybe it simply waits for us.
The coffee cup waits in the cupboard.
The chair waits beside the table.
The neighbor still waves.
The morning sun still comes through the window at approximately the same angle it did before we left.
And somewhere in all those ordinary things is a quiet invitation:
Come back when you’re ready.
Grief and memory have their own timetable. They don’t care much about schedules, calendars, appointments, or the number of miles between Oklahoma and Arizona.
You can unpack the suitcase long before you’ve unpacked everything you carried home inside your heart.
And that’s all right.
There is no requirement that we immediately return to being exactly who we were before we left.
Life changes us.
Goodbyes change us.
Reunions change us.
Standing in a cemetery surrounded by people who cared enough to simply show up changes us.
And sometimes a long stretch of highway gives us enough quiet to realize just how much.
So this morning, I am not asking much from the day.
I have coffee.
I have Steve.
I have Otis nearby, undoubtedly supervising everything and making certain no suspicious delivery trucks invade the neighborhood.
And I have another morning.
For today, that is enough.
Perhaps that is one of the lessons we miss when life becomes too busy.
We spend so much time looking for the extraordinary that we forget how precious the ordinary really is.
A cup of coffee.
Someone sitting across the room.
A familiar voice.
A dog sleeping nearby.
A home waiting at the end of the road.
And another sunrise giving us one more opportunity to love the people around us a little better than we did yesterday.
The road has finally grown quiet.
And this morning, I think I’ll simply sit here for a while and listen to it.
Have a wonderful Friday, my friends.
Pour another cup if you need one.
Sometimes the best thing we can do after a long journey is remember how good it feels to be home.
Have a Great Day from benandsteve.com — and remember, sometimes the ordinary things waiting for us at home are among life’s greatest blessings.
After a long and emotional trip to Oklahoma, coming home feels different. This morning’s coffee is about gratitude, memories, and the quiet comfort of returning to familiar places and familiar routines.
There is something about the first cup of coffee after a long trip that tastes a little different.
Maybe it is because the coffee is being poured from your own pot again. Maybe it is the familiar chair, the familiar morning light, or simply the comfort of knowing that for the moment, there is nowhere you have to be.
The trip carried more emotion than miles. We traveled roads filled with memories, family, laughter, quiet moments, and goodbyes. We visited places that have been woven through my life for as long as I can remember. We spent time with people I love, remembered those who are no longer with us, and completed a journey that had been waiting for us for quite some time.
And now we are home.
The suitcases may still need attention. There are probably things sitting somewhere they do not belong. Otis is undoubtedly pleased to have returned to his familiar territory, where he can once again supervise the neighborhood and make certain nothing suspicious happens without his approval.
But this morning, none of that seems terribly important.
Sometimes coming home is not simply walking through your own front door. It is the moment when your mind finally catches up with your body.
You sit down.
You pour the coffee.
And suddenly you realize just how much has happened.
There are trips we take for vacations, trips we take for adventure, and trips we take because life has asked something of us. This Oklahoma trip was one of those journeys that asked something from the heart.
I returned carrying memories I did not have when I left.
Some made me smile.
Some brought tears.
Some reminded me exactly where I came from.
And perhaps that is one of the quiet gifts of going home to the places that helped make us who we are. We discover that although the towns change, people move away, generations pass, and familiar landmarks disappear, a part of us never really leaves.
It waits there for us.
Along an old highway.
Inside a cemetery gate.
Around a family conversation.
Beside a familiar Oklahoma field.
And then we bring a little of it home with us again.
So this morning, my coffee is not asking me to accomplish anything profound. It is simply reminding me to be grateful.
Grateful for the journey.
Grateful for the people who showed up.
Grateful for the memories.
And especially grateful for the privilege of coming home.
Sometimes the greatest comfort in traveling a long road is discovering that your own coffee cup was waiting for you at the end of it.
Have a great day from benandsteve.com — and remember, sometimes coming home is where the healing begins.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
We spend so much time looking at how far we have left to go that we sometimes forget the miles already behind us. This morning’s coffee is a reminder to turn around occasionally and appreciate just how far you’ve come.
We think about what needs to be done today, what is waiting for us tomorrow, and where we hope to be sometime down the road.
We don’t often turn around and look behind us.
Maybe we should.
There are roads you’ve already traveled that once frightened you.
There were problems you were certain you couldn’t solve.
There were nights you wondered how you would make it until morning.
There were changes you didn’t ask for, goodbyes you weren’t ready to say, and circumstances you never imagined would become part of your story.
Yet here you are.
Coffee in hand.
Another morning.
Still going.
We have a habit of measuring ourselves by how far we have left to go instead of recognizing how far we have already come.
It’s a little like climbing a hill while staring only at the top.
Every step reminds you that you aren’t there yet.
But turn around for a moment.
Look at the distance behind you.
Suddenly, those little steps don’t seem so little anymore.
Life is like that.
Growth rarely announces itself while it’s happening.
We simply get up each morning and keep going.
We learn.
We adjust.
We stumble.
We get back up.
And somewhere along the way, without realizing it, we become stronger than the person who first started down the road.
Maybe you’re not where you hoped you would be by now.
That’s all right.
Perhaps there are things you still want to accomplish, relationships you want to mend, places you want to see, or pieces of yourself you’re still trying to understand.
Keep going.
But every once in a while, turn around.
Remember the things you’ve survived.
Remember the lessons you’ve learned.
Remember the people you’ve loved and the people who loved you along the way.
Give yourself credit for the miles already traveled.
You earned every one of them.
Sometimes we need to stop asking, “How much farther?” and take a moment to say, “Look how far I’ve come.”
So this morning, before you hurry toward whatever is waiting ahead, sit with your coffee for another minute.
Look back down the road.
That person standing there in your memories had no idea whether they would make it this far.
But they did.
You did.
And today, the road continues.
Now, let’s have another cup before we get moving.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Sometimes the best thing a morning can bring is absolutely nothing extraordinary. An ordinary Tuesday, a familiar chair, a dog underfoot, and a warm cup of coffee can remind us that the everyday moments are often the ones holding our lives together.
It doesn’t arrive with a marching band. There are usually no balloons tied to the mailbox, nobody sends you a card congratulating you for making it, and unless you’ve made special plans, Tuesday doesn’t expect very much from you.
It simply shows up.
And sometimes, that is exactly what we need.
This morning, the coffee pot doesn’t know where I’ve been. It doesn’t care how many miles I’ve traveled, what happened yesterday, or what might be waiting tomorrow.
Its job is remarkably simple.
Make coffee.
I appreciate that kind of dependability.
There are times in our lives when everything seems important. Every telephone call matters. Every appointment has to be remembered. Every mile has a destination, and every day on the calendar has something written beside it.
Then eventually, along comes an ordinary morning.
You wake up.
You shuffle toward the kitchen.
You put on the coffee.
Maybe the dog looks at you as though breakfast is already fifteen minutes late.
You look out the window and discover that the world managed to keep turning while you were asleep.
And suddenly the biggest decision facing you might be whether you want another cup.
Those ordinary mornings don’t receive enough credit.
We spend so much of our lives waiting for the big things—the vacation, the birthday, the reunion, the promotion, the holiday, the celebration—that we sometimes overlook the hundreds of perfectly ordinary days holding everything together.
But those are the days where most of life actually happens.
Tuesday morning coffee.
A familiar chair.
A dog underfoot.
Someone you love somewhere nearby.
A little sunlight coming through the window.
Nothing remarkable enough to make the evening news, but everything important enough to make a life.
Maybe that’s why I’ve grown to appreciate ordinary things so much.
They don’t demand anything from us.
They simply remind us that we’re still here.
There are chores to do today. There will probably be something that doesn’t go according to plan. Somebody somewhere will irritate us. Something will make us laugh. We’ll forget why we walked into a room at least once, and we’ll probably remember something important five minutes after we should have remembered it.
In other words, it should be a perfectly normal day.
And this morning, that sounds pretty good to me.
So here’s to Tuesday.
Here’s to the coffee pot doing exactly what it was designed to do.
Here’s to familiar faces, ordinary conversations, dogs who believe every day should revolve around them, and all those little moments we rarely recognize as blessings until someday we miss them.
You don’t need something extraordinary to happen today for today to matter.
Sometimes the ordinary day is the gift.
Pour yourself another cup.
Tuesday has arrived.
And that’s news enough for this morning.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Today’s coffee is taking a slightly different route. Instead of our usual routine, let’s wander past the living room and settle at the kitchen table for a genuine, heart-to-heart chat.
When you’re preparing for a monumental life event—or carrying the weight of a major loss—it’s easy to get so consumed by the details that you completely forget to make room for yourself. But eventually, a quiet demand surfaces: you have to check in with your own soul.
Sometimes that moment looks like spilling your guts over coffee with a close friend. Other times, it’s shutting out the world to lose yourself in a book. Or maybe it’s that solitary drive where a single song hits the radio, hitting a hidden nerve and giving you permission to finally let the tears flow.
Grief isn’t a neat, linear line. We navigate through denial, anger, bargaining, blame, and eventually, acceptance. Along that winding road, sight and sound often act as our gentlest guides. A song can break through our defenses in an instant, but a powerful movie can do the exact same thing.
There have been times when I thought I had processed the death of a loved one, only to realize years later that watching a specific scene on screen was the final key to truly letting go. Which brings me to the real heart of this morning’s conversation.
The other day, one of my favorite writers posted a simple question: What was the last movie that made you cry?
It took me a millisecond to answer: The Lost Valentine, starring Betty White.
Even though it was made years before she passed away, I didn’t discover it until after her death, which made watching it even more emotional. It’s a classic Hallmark tearjerker, but as anyone who knows me will tell you, it takes a massive, deeply moving story to get me invested in a movie—let alone shed a tear.
If you’re in the mood for a genuine emotional breakdown, put down your phone, close your laptop, and give it a watch. If you aren’t reaching for the tissues like a church lady at a revival by the end, something is seriously wrong!
Here’s the trailer to get you primed: The Lost Valentine, starring Betty White
After traveling hundreds of miles with us—from Arizona, through New Mexico and Texas, and finally into Oklahoma—we brought her to Binger.
Her last ride is over.
She rests beside my father now.
And this morning, life has done that peculiar thing it always does after a loss.
It continued.
The sun came up.
Someone started a car.
A dog needed attention.
Coffee had to be made.
The world didn’t stop simply because something monumental happened in mine.
Perhaps that is one of life’s quietest lessons.
We spend days preparing ourselves for the big moments—the service, the goodbye, the final prayer. But nobody prepares us quite as well for the morning afterward.
The morning when there is nowhere else we need to take them.
No arrangements left to make.
No more miles left to drive.
Just memories.
Yesterday, I stood in Oklahoma soil and helped return my mother to the place that had shaped so much of her life.
Today, I can begin carrying her differently.
Not in a special carrier.
Not buckled safely into the vehicle.
Not guarded faithfully by Otis.
I carry her in stories.
I carry her in the expressions I inherited without realizing it.
I carry her in memories of childhood, family gatherings, arguments, laughter, disappointments, forgiveness, and all those wonderfully complicated things that make a family a family.
Perhaps that’s what we eventually discover about saying goodbye.
The people we love don’t simply disappear down some road behind us.
They become part of the traveler.
And so this morning, I will have another cup of coffee.
Then Steve, Otis, and I will eventually point ourselves toward Arizona.
There will be an empty place in the vehicle where Mom rode with us.
But I don’t think she’s leaving Oklahoma alone.
A little bit of her will be going home with me.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Coffee is that wonderful drink that calms the soul—without calming you so much that you wake up the next morning with your best friend asking, “Do you remember what you did last night?”
Drink coffee. Lots of coffee. Your reputation may depend on it. ☕
And then there are mornings when you wrap both hands around the cup because you need something steady to hold.
This is one of those mornings.
Today, we are taking Mom home.
Before we reach Binger, I want her final journey to pass through some of the places that belong to our family’s story.
Marjorie Groff at the Homestead
We will travel near Sentinel, Oklahoma, past the country where her parents made their home in the 1930s.
Then we will continue toward Cordell.
That’s where I was born.
I find something deeply meaningful about carrying my mother past the place where she once carried me. While raising my sister. Along with other other siblings.
Then we will travel east toward Binger.
There, at Binger Murray Cemetery, my mother will finally be laid to rest beside my father, JD Groff.
For so many years, they traveled through life together. They raised a family. They worked. They struggled. They laughed. They disagreed. They grew older.
But their lives became part of ours, and whatever else can be said about the years behind us, one truth remains:
They were Mom and Dad.
Today, Steve will be beside me. Otis will have completed his special assignment. Family and friends will gather. Words will be spoken. Memories will be shared.
And eventually there will come a moment when there is nothing left for me to do except say goodbye.
Or perhaps not goodbye.
Maybe simply:
We got you here, Mom.
You’re home.
This morning’s coffee is for everyone who has ever had to make that final journey with someone they love.
Drink it slowly.
Remember them well.
And when the time comes, let them go with love.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
“We are remembering our mother over coffee this year. It is her first birthday since she has been gone—the first birthday we have not been able to celebrate with her. But we will celebrate her, remembering the life she lived and the memories she left behind.”
Yesterday, Steve and I carried my mother across the miles, with Otis faithfully keeping watch beside her. Somewhere along the way, the landscape began changing into something familiar.
Home.
It’s an interesting word, isn’t it?
We spend much of our lives deciding where home is. We move. We build lives elsewhere. We find people we love and create new homes with them. Yet there are places buried so deeply within us that merely seeing the countryside can awaken memories we didn’t realize were still there.
Today, Mom rests in Elk City.
It is a town woven into Steve’s and my story because this is where we met in 1982. We couldn’t have known then where the road ahead would take us.
And we certainly couldn’t have imagined that more than forty years later we would return together carrying my mother on the final miles of her journey.
Tomorrow will be different.
Tomorrow we will travel through country filled with family history.
We will take Mom near Sentinel, past the land where her parents made their home during the 1930s. We will continue toward Cordell, where my own story began, and then east toward Binger—the community where so much of our family’s life unfolded.
Tomorrow, my mother’s journey ends beside my father.
But not today.
Today is for remembering.
Today is for another cup of coffee, another Oklahoma morning, and the realization that sometimes going home isn’t about returning to a house.
Sometimes it is simply about returning to the people and places that made us who we are.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Some places hold more than memories—they hold the names of people who helped make us who we are. This morning in Elk City, Oklahoma, Steve and I spend a little time with family, remember those who came before us, and reflect on the place where our story together began nearly forty-four years ago.
There is something different about having your morning coffee in a place that already knows so much of your story.
This morning, Steve and I should be waking up in Elk City, Oklahoma.
A couple walks home along a farm road as the sun sets over rural Oklahoma.
We thought yesterday’s miles would be behind us for a little while. Mom would have made the journey with us from Arizona, across New Mexico and Texas, and back into Oklahoma, with Otis faithfully carrying out his special assignment of watching over her along the way. Today, however, we aren’t quite there yet. We stopped in Tucumcari—the roadside signs finally got us. Tucumcari tonight! If you’ve ever traveled Route 66 or Interstate 40, you know what I am talking about. We thought we would give Mother one more night in a Best Western.
Today we will hurry on our way just as soon as Steve reloads the car so the weight is properly distributed. If you have seen those television advertisements about “becoming your parents,” they are so true—especially when I watch the things my husband does!
My sister Twila will be waiting for us, along with my niece Amanda, her son Trysen, and other family members and friends. I sent a message last night saying we were on our way, and that the reason for arriving a day behind schedule was “due to our late mother.” I don’t know if they picked up on the play on words. It was what my dad claimed anytime we were late to a family function, and I was hoping someone would catch it.
Some of these family members we haven’t seen in a while. There will undoubtedly be stories told that everyone has heard before—and hopefully a few that somebody has forgotten.
Those are usually the best ones.
Once we arrive, we will probably be escorted through local cemeteries. I know that might sound like a strange way to spend part of a day, but I have never thought of cemeteries as entirely sad places. There is sadness there, certainly. But there is also history.
There are names carved into stones that once belonged to voices. There are dates representing entire lifetimes squeezed between a beginning and an ending. Behind those names are people who worked, worried, laughed, argued, raised families, paid bills, celebrated birthdays, sat around kitchen tables—and probably drank their share of morning coffee.
Some of those names belong to people we loved.
Years ago, Steve and I began our life together here in Elk City. In October of 1982, neither of us could possibly have known just how long the road ahead would be. We couldn’t have imagined all the places it would take us, the people we would meet, the homes we would make, or the memories we would collect. Yet here we are, nearly forty-four years later, back where so much of our story began.
And someday, when our travels are finally finished, this is where we have arranged to return. Steve and I have made arrangements to be laid to rest here in Elk City, so while we’re in town, we’ll check on our cemetery plots and make sure everything is squared away with the cemetery authorities.
That isn’t something I find particularly gloomy. Actually, I find a certain peace in it.
There is something comforting about knowing where the road eventually leads—not because you’re anxious to reach the destination, but because it allows you to spend less time worrying about the ending and more time enjoying everything between here and there. And Steve and I still have plenty of road ahead of us.
For now, there are people to visit. There are stories to tell. There are graves where we may stand quietly for a moment and remember. And there is my mother, traveling with us toward the place where, in two days, she will finally be laid beside my father.
Perhaps that is what today is really about. Coming home. Mom is coming home.
Steve and I have come back to the town where our life together began, surrounded by generations of people whose lives helped make ours possible.
This morning, I’ll raise my coffee cup to all of them—the ones sitting around the table with us and the ones whose chairs have been empty for many years. Because family isn’t measured only by who can still answer when you call their name. Sometimes family is measured by the names we refuse to forget.
And maybe that’s one of the reasons we visit old cemeteries. We aren’t visiting death. We’re visiting lives.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
There are times in ones life, when going home is all about visiting relatives. Then there are times when, going home is all about taking what is left of life back with you.
There are some journeys in life you know you will remember every mile of.
This morning, Steve and I are carrying my mother home. She will be going to see her daughter Twila.
Her name is Marjorie Bernice Groff, and after 95 years of living, loving, raising a family, making mistakes, making memories, and leaving pieces of herself in all of us, she is taking one final ride from Arizona to Oklahoma.
[Left to Right: Marjorie Bernice (McWhirter) Groff, with her parents G.W.(Bill) McWhirter, and Bernice Mae McWhirter]
And we’re not hurrying.
Her special carrier is safely buckled beside our trustworthy little traveling companion, Otis. He has been given an important assignment for this trip: protect Grandma.
I have no doubt he takes the responsibility seriously.
We will cross Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and finally enter Oklahoma. Along the way, when there is something worth seeing, we’ll make sure Mom gets to see it. An overlook, a beautiful stretch of country, an unusual roadside attraction—whatever catches our attention.
After all, when you’re taking your mother on her last road trip, there is no reason to rush.
Maybe that sounds a little unusual to some people. But grief has taught me that ceremony doesn’t always have to happen inside a church or beside a grave. Sometimes ceremony is simply two people, a little dog, an open highway, and someone precious riding beside you.
Tonight, we will reach Elk City, Oklahoma.
That seems especially fitting.
It was there, in 1982, that Steve and I first met. More than four decades later, the two of us will arrive there together carrying my mother home.
Life has a strange way of bringing roads back around to where they began.
So this morning’s coffee is going into a travel mug.
There are miles ahead of us.
Mom has one last Oklahoma sunset waiting for her.
And Otis has Grandma to protect.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
There are probably people carrying a good memory of something you did long ago, even though you’ve forgotten all about it. This morning’s coffee is a reminder that the smallest kindness can become part of someone else’s story.
There are people from years ago whom I still remember for the smallest reasons.
They didn’t save my life.
They didn’t give me some great piece of wisdom.
They may not even remember me.
But I remember them.
I remember the person who took an extra moment to explain something when I didn’t understand.
The person who laughed with me when I needed to laugh.
The person who noticed I was having a difficult day and asked, “Are you doing okay?”
The person who poured another cup of coffee without being asked.
Funny, isn’t it?
We often think we have to do something extraordinary to make a difference in somebody’s life.
Most of the time, we don’t.
Sometimes we are remembered simply because we were kind when kindness was needed.
There are probably people walking around today carrying a memory of something you once did for them.
You may have forgotten it completely.
They haven’t.
Maybe you encouraged someone when they were ready to quit.
Maybe you sat beside somebody who didn’t want to be alone.
Maybe you made a child laugh.
Maybe you told someone they were doing a good job when nobody else bothered to notice.
To you, it may have been nothing more than an ordinary moment.
To them, it became part of their story.
That’s something worth thinking about over coffee this morning.
We spend a lot of time wondering what people think of us.
Perhaps a better question is:
How do people feel after they’ve been around us?
Do they leave feeling a little better?
A little more hopeful?
A little less alone?
Because long after people forget what we wore, what we owned, or how important we thought we were, they often remember how we treated them.
And someday, years from now, someone may be sitting at their own kitchen table with a cup of coffee remembering you.
Not because you did something remarkable.
But because, on an ordinary day when they needed it, you were kind.
Never underestimate the possibility that one small kindness from you may become someone else’s lifelong memory.
So today, give somebody something good to remember.
It doesn’t have to cost a thing.
A smile will do.
A kind word will do.
Taking a moment to listen will do.
Sometimes the smallest things stay with us the longest.
Now, how about another cup?
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Don’t decide how the day will end before it has even begun. This morning’s coffee is a reminder to move yesterday’s worries over and leave a little room at the table for something good.
Before our feet touch the floor, we are thinking about yesterday’s problems, today’s responsibilities, and tomorrow’s worries.
Then we pour the coffee and carry all of them to the table with us.
That is quite a crowd for so early in the morning.
I wonder how many good things we miss because we have already decided what kind of day we are going to have.
We tell ourselves the meeting will be difficult.
The person won’t call.
The answer will be no.
Traffic will be terrible.
Something will probably go wrong.
And sometimes we’re right.
But not always.
Every now and then, life surprises us.
The telephone rings, and it is someone we have been thinking about.
A stranger holds the door and smiles.
Someone says something kind when we need to hear it most.
A problem we have worried about for days works itself out with surprisingly little trouble.
Or maybe nothing dramatic happens at all.
Maybe the sun simply comes through the kitchen window at just the right angle, the coffee tastes especially good, and for a few minutes everything feels all right with the world.
Those little moments count too.
We cannot control everything waiting for us today. There will always be things we would rather avoid and circumstances we cannot change.
But we can leave a little room for the possibility that something good might happen.
Hope doesn’t require us to pretend that difficulties don’t exist.
It simply asks us not to decide the ending before the day has had a chance to begin.
So while you’re sitting there with your coffee this morning, move yesterday’s worries over just a little bit.
You don’t have to throw them away.
Just don’t give them the whole table.
Save an empty chair for something unexpected.
Leave a little room for laughter.
Leave a little room for kindness.
Leave a little room for somebody to surprise you.
And most of all, leave a little room for something good.
Because this day hasn’t happened before.
You don’t know everything it is bringing with it.
Don’t let yesterday convince you that you already know how today will end.
Now take another sip.
Morning has only just arrived.
Let’s give it a chance.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Not every morning needs to be extraordinary. Sometimes the quiet, ordinary moments—the warm coffee, familiar voices, and people nearby—are the ones we eventually miss the most. Come sit for a while. The coffee is ready…
The coffee is brewing. The house is quiet. Somewhere outside, a bird is carrying on a conversation with another bird that apparently has a great deal to say.
And nothing particularly important is happening.
We have become so accustomed to looking for significance that we sometimes overlook the beauty of an ordinary day.
We celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, graduations, promotions, and all those other days we circle on the calendar. We take photographs. We gather people together. We remember them years later.
But when we look back on our lives, something interesting happens.
We begin missing the ordinary days too.
We remember sitting at the kitchen table while someone we loved stood at the counter.
We remember hearing their footsteps coming down the hallway.
We remember the sound of the screen door closing.
We remember someone asking, “Want another cup?”
At the time, none of it seemed important enough to remember.
Yet somehow we did.
Maybe that is because a life isn’t made mostly from extraordinary moments.
It is made from thousands upon thousands of ordinary ones.
The morning somebody handed you a cup of coffee.
The afternoon you sat on the porch doing absolutely nothing.
The evening everyone was home and nobody realized how precious that would someday become.
We didn’t know we were making memories.
We thought we were simply living.
Perhaps that is something worth remembering this morning.
You don’t have to accomplish something remarkable today for today to matter.
You don’t need a celebration.
You don’t need an announcement.
You don’t even need a particularly good story to tell when the day is finished.
Sometimes it is enough that the people you care about are nearby, the coffee is warm, and another morning has found its way to your door.
So don’t hurry through all of it.
Take an extra sip.
Listen to the sounds around you.
Notice who’s sitting across the table.
Someday you may discover that the mornings you once thought were ordinary were some of the most precious mornings you ever had.
The ordinary moments of today may become the treasured memories of tomorrow.
And that seems like a pretty good reason to pour another cup.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Not every road we travel is one we planned to take. Sometimes the detour introduces us to people, places, and possibilities we would have otherwise missed. Grab your coffee—we’re taking the scenic route this morning.
We know where we need to be, what needs to get done, and perhaps even what time we hope to have everything finished.
Then life puts up a detour sign.
Something changes.
A telephone call comes. Someone needs us. The car won’t start. The appointment runs late. A plan we were counting on falls apart. Suddenly, the road we expected to travel is closed, and we are headed somewhere we never intended to go.
I have traveled enough country roads in my life to know that detours can be frustrating.
But I have also discovered something else about them.
Sometimes the road you didn’t intend to travel shows you something you would never have seen otherwise.
You notice an old farmhouse sitting beneath a grove of trees. You cross a creek you didn’t know existed. You find a little town you have never visited. Maybe you meet someone you would never have met had everything gone according to plan.
Life works much the same way.
Some of the people who become important to us arrive because something else didn’t work out. Some of our greatest opportunities begin with disappointment. Some of the stories we eventually treasure started on days when we thought everything was going wrong.
That doesn’t mean every detour is pleasant.
Some are difficult. Some hurt. Some take us a long way from where we thought we would be.
But getting somewhere differently doesn’t always mean we are lost.
So, as you have your coffee this morning, perhaps there is something in your life that hasn’t gone according to plan.
You may be staring at a detour sign right now, wondering why the road ahead had to change.
Give it a little time.
Keep going.
Look out the window along the way.
There may be something waiting on this road that you could never have found on the one you originally planned to travel.
Sometimes the unexpected road becomes the one that takes us exactly where we needed to go.
Pour yourself another cup.
We’ve still got some traveling to do.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
We spend so much time trying to finish everything that we sometimes forget to appreciate simply moving forward. Grab your cup. This morning, one small step is enough.
We pour the coffee, look at the day ahead, and begin making a list in our minds. Things that need doing. People who need calling. Problems that need solving. Yesterday’s unfinished business somehow finds its way onto today’s kitchen table before we have even taken the first sip.
But maybe everything doesn’t need to be finished today.
Some things simply take time.
I think back to the way people once approached ordinary work. A garden wasn’t planted in the morning and harvested that afternoon. A fence was built one post at a time. A long trip was measured in miles traveled, not merely by how quickly you reached the destination.
There was an understanding that worthwhile things often required patience.
We sometimes forget that when it comes to ourselves.
We expect answers immediately. We want worries settled, grief healed, relationships repaired, and uncertainty resolved before bedtime. When that doesn’t happen, we can feel as though we somehow failed the day.
But perhaps today’s accomplishment is simply moving one step forward.
Maybe you make the telephone call.
Maybe you write the first paragraph.
Maybe you forgive a little.
Maybe you worry a little less.
Maybe you finally sit quietly for ten minutes with a cup of coffee and realize the world managed to keep turning without your supervision.
There will always be something left undone when evening comes. That isn’t failure. That is life reminding us there is another day waiting.
So this morning, don’t measure your day by everything you manage to finish.
Measure it by whether you moved something worthwhile a little farther down the road.
And if all you manage today is one small step, remember:
A small step forward is still farther than you were yesterday.
Pour yourself another cup.
Tomorrow will have its own list.
For now, this morning is enough.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
Excerpt
Not everything needs to be finished today. Some things simply take time. This morning’s coffee is a reminder that one small step forward can be enough.
Before the day gets busy, pour yourself a cup of coffee and stay here for just a moment.
We spend a surprising amount of our lives waiting for something. We wait for Friday, for vacation, for better weather, for the next celebration, or for the day when things finally settle down.
Meanwhile, life keeps happening.
It is happening in the coffee you’re holding. In the morning light coming through the window. In the familiar voice from the other room. In the dog waiting patiently for you to notice him. In the ordinary little routines we sometimes hurry through without realizing how precious they are.
Years from now, some of the things we barely notice today may be the very things we would give anything to experience once more.
So don’t rush through all of today trying to reach tomorrow.
Drink the coffee while it’s warm. Listen to the story you’ve heard a hundred times. Say “I love you.” Stay an extra minute when your heart tells you to stay.
There will always be somewhere else to go.
But there will never be another today.
Take a little time to notice your life while you’re living it. You may discover that an ordinary Tuesday was something pretty wonderful after all.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
☕ Morning Coffee
Before You Hurry Past It
Good morning, my friends.
Before the day gets busy, pour yourself a cup of coffee and stay here for just a moment.
We spend a surprising amount of our lives waiting for something. We wait for Friday, for vacation, for better weather, for the next celebration, or for the day when things finally settle down.
Meanwhile, life keeps happening.
It is happening in the coffee you’re holding. In the morning light coming through the window. In the familiar voice from the other room. In the dog waiting patiently for you to notice him. In the ordinary little routines we sometimes hurry through without realizing how precious they are.
Years from now, some of the things we barely notice today may be the very things we would give anything to experience once more.
So don’t rush through all of today trying to reach tomorrow.
Drink the coffee while it’s warm. Listen to the story you’ve heard a hundred times. Say “I love you.” Stay an extra minute when your heart tells you to stay.
There will always be somewhere else to go.
But there will never be another today.
Take a little time to notice your life while you’re living it. You may discover that an ordinary Tuesday was something pretty wonderful after all.
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
The act of good will you do today may be the blessing you receive tomorrow.
Good morning, my friends,
Pour yourself a cup of coffee, settle into your favorite chair, and stay here with me for a few minutes before we get started with the day.
Have you ever noticed how the smallest kindness can stay with you for years?
Someone once offered you a seat when you were tired. A friend called at exactly the right moment. A teacher believed in you when you weren’t quite sure you believed in yourself. Perhaps somebody simply looked across a table and said, “I’m glad you’re here.”
They may have forgotten the moment entirely.
You didn’t.
How’s your coffee this morning?
That’s something worth remembering as we begin today. We never really know which of our ordinary actions will become part of someone else’s treasured memories.
So hold the door. Make the call. Give the compliment. Pour someone another cup. And if somebody seems like they could use a little encouragement, don’t wait for them to ask.
The world doesn’t always need another grand gesture.
Sometimes it just needs another good person having an ordinary day and choosing to be kind.
Go into today knowing that something very small you do may become something very big in the heart of someone else.
Would you like another cup?
Until tomorrow, may your coffee stay warm, your memories stay close, and your hope stay strong. The coffee will be waiting again tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be here to share it with me.
— Benjamin Groff II Morning Coffee at benandsteve.com
The old coffee pot had learned something after all these years.
People rarely gathered around it because they needed coffee.
They gathered because they needed each other.
Morning after morning, the familiar aroma drifted through the house, inviting everyone to slow down for just a little while. Before the first sip was taken, there were stories waiting to be told, questions waiting to be asked, and worries waiting to be shared.
As you cradle your cup of coffee, remember that life is built more by ordinary mornings than extraordinary moments.
The coffee pot listened to them all.
It heard fathers wondering how they would provide for their families.
It heard mothers quietly carrying burdens they never wanted their children to see.
It heard young couples dreaming about homes they hoped to build, and grandparents smiling as they watched another generation begin its journey.
The coffee pot offered no advice.
It couldn’t solve a single problem.
But it noticed something remarkable.
When people gathered around the table with warm cups in their hands, life somehow became a little easier to carry.
Troubles didn’t disappear.
They simply became lighter because they were shared.
Over the years, the coffee pot witnessed tears that no one expected, laughter that filled the kitchen until everyone forgot what had been troubling them, and prayers whispered before the day began.
It watched empty chairs become full again with new faces, and full tables slowly grow quieter as time moved on.
The old coffee pot came to understand that its greatest purpose had never been making coffee.
Its purpose was creating a place where people felt welcome enough to stay.
Maybe that’s why coffee has always tasted a little better when someone else is sitting across the table.
It isn’t the coffee that warms us the most.
It’s the company.
Tomorrow morning, before you hurry off to whatever the day has planned, linger just a little longer.
Someone may need your conversation more than they need another cup of coffee.
Sometimes the greatest gift we can offer another person is simply our presence.
It sat quietly on the counter. No flashing lights. No digital display. It never argued with anyone. It simply had one responsibility—to protect what would feed the family tomorrow.
The bread box never baked the bread.
It never claimed credit for the farmer who grew the wheat or the baker who rose before daylight. It simply understood that once something valuable arrived, someone had to take care of it.
The old bread box had standards.
It wasn’t a storage place for everything. You didn’t toss old newspapers inside. You didn’t fill it with junk because there happened to be empty space. It knew the difference between what nourished a family and what merely occupied room.
Then one day people decided bread boxes were old-fashioned.
“We don’t need that anymore,”
they said.
The bread was left lying on the counter where it dried out a little more each day. Some blamed the bread. Others blamed the weather. Still others insisted nothing had changed at all.
The bread, of course, never argued.
It simply became stale.
And the remarkable thing about stale bread is this: it doesn’t happen all at once. You rarely notice it from one day to the next. It is only when you pick up the loaf and wonder what happened that you realize something important had quietly disappeared.
The bread box never made promises.
It never claimed it could improve the bread.
It simply protected it from becoming something it was never intended to be.
Perhaps that is the purpose of more things in life than we realize.
Sometimes the quiet, ordinary things aren’t there because they are exciting.
They are there because they have learned that what is worth keeping is usually worth protecting.
Look around your home. Every ordinary thing has a story. Sometimes, it’s really about us.
There was a time when buying a loaf of bread was about as controversial as life could become.
Promises vs. Results.
Politics has become much the same way. Somewhere along the road we stopped asking one simple question:
Today, mentioning the price of that same loaf can start an argument.
“Did the last promises work?”
Every election season arrives with a fresh collection of guarantees. Taxes will go down. Jobs will multiply. Government will shrink. Crime will disappear. Inflation will be conquered. Our freedoms will be protected. We are assured that prosperity is just one election away.
Then four years pass.
The speeches become campaign commercials. The commercials become memories. And before long, many of us find ourselves hearing nearly the same promises from many of the same people, while somehow convincing ourselves this time the outcome will be different.
Perhaps before accepting another promise, we should compare it with the last one.
What were we told in 2024?
What actually happened?
Not what our favorite television network says happened. Not what social media insists happened. What changed in our own lives?
What happened to grocery prices?
What happened to gasoline?
Could you buy more—or less—with the paycheck you earned?
Did your insurance go up?
Did your property taxes change?
Did your retirement account grow or shrink?
Did your neighborhood become safer?
Those answers are far more valuable than any campaign slogan.
None of this means every promise failed. Governments accomplish some things and fall short on others. The honest voter should be willing to acknowledge both.
That requires something becoming increasingly rare in America—an honest inventory.
The next time someone tells you what tomorrow will look like, don’t begin by looking forward.
Begin by looking backward.
History may not predict the future, but it usually leaves enough footprints to tell us where we’ve already walked.Years ago, neighbors could spend an afternoon arguing over whosesourdough recipe made the better loaf, and everyone still shared a slice afterward.
Today, mention the price of that loaf—or the politician who promised to make it cheaper—and you may lose a friend before the bread comes out of the oven. That’s unfortunate, because both subjects have something in common. Good bread takes patience, honest ingredients, and careful attention. Good government should require no less. ––– Benjamin!
Dad taught me so much, while saying nothing at all…
My father never gave speeches about treating people fairly.
Groff’s Barber Shop – Equality Before Its Time.
He didn’t quote famous leaders. He didn’t lecture me about prejudice or equality. In fact, I don’t ever remember us having a conversation about race.
He simply lived his life in a way that made those conversations unnecessary.
Growing up, my father was the only barber in our little Oklahoma town of about 750 souls. It was the 1960s, and like many small towns across America, ours had invisible lines that everyone seemed to understand. One section of town was where the Black families lived. I never really understood why. To me, it was simply another neighborhood where some of my classmates lived.
Every so often, a Black mother would bring her four boys into my father’s barber shop for haircuts. It never failed. Someone sitting in the waiting area would quietly get up, walk out the door, and leave.
As a little boy, I didn’t understand what I had just witnessed.
Neither, it seemed, did my father.
Without missing a beat, he would drape the barber’s cape around the first young man and go to work as though nothing unusual had happened. If I happened to ask about the customers who left, Dad’s answer was always the same.
“They’ll be back,” he would say. “I’m the only barber in town. Otherwise, they’ll have to drive forty miles for a haircut.”
There was never anger in his voice. Never judgment. Never a sermon.
Just the quiet confidence of a man who knew what was right and wasn’t about to change because someone else disapproved.
On Sunday mornings, we’d often visit families in that same neighborhood. I played with kids who happened to be Black, but to me they were simply classmates and friends. Our school wasn’t large enough for anyone to disappear into the crowd. My graduating class would eventually reach only twenty-eight students.
Then I started watching the evening news.
Night after night, television showed marches, protests, violence, and hatred taking place around the country. I remember thinking how strange it all seemed. I honestly believed most people lived the way my father did.
One summer, during a trip to the Oklahoma State Fair, I wandered into one of the exhibit buildings after I had seen everything that interested me. An older Black gentleman was working there as a maintenance employee, keeping an eye on the building.
We struck up a conversation.
Before long, we were swapping stories as though we’d known each other for years. I told him about my hometown, my father, and the barber shop. Before leaving, I casually said, “If you’re ever out our way, stop in.”
I never expected him to take me up on the invitation.
Several weeks later, I was cleaning my bedroom when my father called me into the living room.
“There’s a gentleman here who says he knows you,” Dad said with a puzzled smile. “And he insists I must be a perfect father to have raised such a son.”
Standing there was my friend from the State Fair.
I couldn’t believe he had actually come.
We spent the afternoon walking around our place, catching up as if no time had passed at all. Looking back, I doubt either of us thought much about the color of our skin. We were simply two people who had enjoyed each other’s company.
It wasn’t until years later, when the television miniseries Roots aired, that I began to understand what so many Americans had experienced. Like millions of others, I watched every episode. But I also watched the conversations that followed. Neighbors talked. Classmates talked. Adults revealed opinions I had never heard before.
For the first time, I realized prejudice wasn’t something found only on the evening news. Sometimes it lived much closer to home.
After graduating and entering law enforcement, my father’s quiet example stayed with me.
One evening I watched another officer use what I believed was excessive force during an arrest. I couldn’t undo what had happened, but I could make certain the young man wasn’t alone afterward. I volunteered to transport him to jail.
On the drive, I explained how he could file a civil rights complaint if he believed his rights had been violated. Before we arrived, I asked him to promise me he would follow through.
When I returned from my scheduled days off, I was instructed to report to the Major’s office.
My assignment changed.
For what seemed like forever, I cleaned dog kennels at the city’s animal shelter.
Some might say I paid a price.
I never saw it that way.
Long before I wore a badge, I had watched a barber quietly refuse to let other people’s prejudice determine how he would treat another human being.
He never gave me a lecture about equality.
He never told me how to live my life.
He simply cut hair.
And somewhere between that old barber chair, a surprise visit from a friend I met at the State Fair, and the lessons that followed me into a police uniform, I learned that integrity isn’t something you talk about.
It’s something you do.
My father probably never realized he was teaching me one of the greatest lessons of my life.
Then again, maybe that’s how the best teachers always work.
Author’s Note
Longtime readers of benandsteve.com may recognize portions of this story. Over the years, these memories have appeared as part of other, larger stories on the blog. However, they have never been told as a story of their own.
As I continue writing and publishing my life story, I’ve come to realize that this particular memory deserved to stand on its own. The events surrounding my father’s barber shop, my unexpected friendship at the Oklahoma State Fair, and the lessons those experiences carried into my years in law enforcement are explored in greater detail throughout my memoir.
Sometimes a single moment in life is important enough to be remembered twice—once as part of a larger journey, and once for the lesson it taught.
Why benandsteve.com will always be a place where stories, neighbors, and simple conversation matter more than bells and whistles.
There was a time when nearly every town had a little Mom and Pop general store. It wasn’t the biggest building in town. It didn’t have flashing lights, endless aisles, or a parking lot the size of a football field. But it had something far more important.
Are too many changes, causing you a blur?
It had people.
You stopped in because you needed a loaf of bread, a box of nails, a spool of thread, or maybe just a cold bottle of pop on a hot afternoon. Before long you found yourself visiting with a neighbor, catching up on local happenings, or hearing a story you hadn’t expected to hear. You came for one thing and often left with something entirely different.
That’s the way I have always wanted benandsteve.com to be.
It isn’t meant to be the biggest website on the internet. It isn’t trying to become a corporate media empire with every new bell, whistle, gadget, and artificial intelligence feature someone insists I must install before tomorrow. Every few days another message appears telling me I need this plug-in, that application, another update, another subscription, or one more feature that promises to make everything “better.”
Sometimes I wonder if the people designing these things have forgotten that simple still works.
I’m not trying to build a shining city on a hill. I’m simply trying to keep the lights on in my little general store.
When you stop by, I hope you’ll find a good story, a bit of history, a few headlines worth knowing, perhaps an obituary honoring someone who deserved to be remembered, or news about the men and women who serve in law enforcement, fire, EMS, and emergency services. Maybe you’ll discover something you didn’t expect. Maybe you’ll leave with a smile, a memory, or a thought worth carrying into the rest of your day.
The internet doesn’t always have to be loud. It doesn’t always have to flash, blink, autoplay, notify, or demand your attention every five seconds. Sometimes it’s enough to simply open the front door, hear it creak a little, and know the owner is behind the counter ready to say, “Good to see you. What’s new?”
That is what I hope benandsteve.com continues to be.
What you see is what you get.
No gimmicks. No smoke and mirrors. Just stories, memories, history, humor, and the occasional opinion from someone who still believes that neighbors matter, truth matters, and a simple conversation is worth preserving.
So pull up a chair. Look around. Read a story or two. And before you head back down the road, don’t forget to wave at the folks coming in behind you.
~ Throughout history there have always been those who stood firm, and those who surrendered their principles for the sake of comfort or fear. Those who exchanged their standards out of weakness and bowed to a tyranny are rarely remembered among the notable. History tends to reserve that honor for those who stood their ground when it mattered most. ~ Benjamin Groff
The Curious Case of J. W. Sims of Stella, Oklahoma
J. W. Sims reminds us that history is not only about governors, oil barons, or outlaws whose names fill books.
In the late 1920s, federal agents traced rumors to an abandoned farm near Stella, Oklahoma.
The countryside was changing—oil derricks dotted the horizon, and automobiles were replacing horses. Amid these modern shifts, tucked away in the woods and hollows of Pottawatomie County, another, older industry quietly flourished.
Moonshine.
It was the era of Prohibition. Though the federal government had outlawed the manufacture and sale of alcohol in 1920, many Oklahomans paid little attention to Washington’s wishes. As a result, hidden stills appeared in creek bottoms and abandoned barns, allowing homemade whiskey to flow through rural communities where neighbors often knew but seldom spoke.
In the midst of this, J. W. Sims emerged.
Little is recorded about Sims. No photos, interviews, or memoirs revealing his perspective remain.
Given the sparse details about Sims, what persists instead are scattered newspaper accounts.
A Tecumseh Oil Record article notes federal agents arrested Harold McGilvery and later J. W. Sims for an illicit distillery near Stella, on an abandoned farm—prime bootlegger territory. The story held no confession or courtroom drama, just a few lines marking another Prohibition struggle in Oklahoma.
Perhaps it is this very lack of detail that makes the story so compelling.
Who was J. W. Sims?
Was he the mastermind behind the operation?
A hired hand trying to earn a living?
A local farmer tempted by quick money during difficult times?
Or was he simply in the wrong place when federal agents arrived?
We do not know.
Oklahoma’s late 1920s were odd times. Oil reshaped fortunes. Towns boomed and disappeared overnight. Beneath this change, illegal whiskey flourished in secrecy, and hidden stills became folklore—spoken of in barbershops and stores.
Thus, the arrest of J. W. Sims reminds us that history is more than stories of governors, oil barons, or famous outlaws.
Sometimes history is a single newspaper clipping.
A forgotten man.
A still hidden in the woods.
A federal raid.
And a mystery left for future generations to piece together.
Today, nearly a century later, J. W. Sims remains a shadow in Oklahoma history. We may never know whether he was a villain, a victim, or simply an ordinary man caught up in extraordinary times.
Near Stella, where prairie grass still bends in the wind, the story of the man at the still lingers.
Waiting for someone to remember.
A note from the writer, One of the descendants of the Sims family drove my rural route school bus. Years later, as a teenager working summers cleaning floors at the school, he would tell me stories about J. W. Sims. It has taken me many years to gather the pieces of those stories and compare them with the historical record. Some parts proved true. Others were undoubtedly embellished over time. Every bit of it, however, was fascinating. The man who shared those stories with me passed away several years ago. On a recent trip back to my hometown, I visited with his relatives and asked for their blessing to tell the tales their father, uncle, and family member had entrusted to me. What you've read and what follows in Parts Two and Three is not just history. It is memory, folklore, and the enduring power of stories passed from one generation to the next. Benjamin H. Groff II
The Town Character. Every community has one of their own…
Not a mayor. Not a banker. Not a preacher.
Someone else.
The person everybody knows.
In small towns, medium-sized towns, and even in the neighborhoods of big cities, there is always that one soul who stands apart. They dress differently. Their clothes may be worn thin from years of use. Their hair may appear to have lost an argument with a comb decades ago. Their conversations wander like a country road with too many turns.
Sometimes they are slow.
Sometimes they are eccentric.
Sometimes they simply march to music no one else can hear.
Yet everyone knows them.
And strangely enough, everyone trusts them.
More than once, I have seen these individuals carrying a ring of keys bigger than any businessman in town owned. Keys to the hardware store. Keys to the church basement. Keys to the barber shop. Keys to the old furnace room beneath the drug store.
While respectable citizens were asleep in warm beds, these town characters were already at work.
They swept sidewalks before dawn.
They shoveled snow.
They lit furnaces.
They hauled groceries.
They checked doors to make certain businesses were secure.
Nobody worried about them stealing.
Nobody worried about them lying.
Because they belonged to the town.
Jack Elam was a town character (or was it caricuture) in Support Your Local Sheriff.
And the town belonged to them.
Children might giggle when they walked by.
Teenagers sometimes rolled their eyes.
Visitors would whisper, “What’s his story?”
The locals would answer simply:
“Oh, that’s just Charlie.”
Or Oris.
Or Lester.
Or Lewis.
Or Mary.
Or J.T.
No last name needed.
Everybody knew.
They were woven into the fabric of the community as surely as the courthouse clock or the old water tower.
In a world now obsessed with wealth, influence, and appearance, I sometimes think we lost something when we stopped noticing these people.
Because they remind us that a person’s value isn’t measured by education, money, or polish.
Sometimes the most trusted person in town is the fellow whose shirt is untucked, whose shoes don’t match, and whose greatest wealth is that everybody knows his heart.
Town Characters have been found throughout history.
Every town has one.
And the lucky towns never forget them.
Keep your local figure close. They are woven into the fabric of your community. You may not realize it now, but they are preserving a piece of today that someday you will treasure as yesterday.
Keep your local figure close. They are woven into the fabric of your community. You may not realize it now, but they are preserving a piece of today that someday you will treasure as yesterday.
On April 1, 2026, benandsteve.com published a completely fictional story claiming that Washington, D.C.’s famous cherry trees were being removed. The article was intentionally written as an April Fools’ Day story, and its closing paragraphs made that clear. It was satire—nothing more.
Or so we thought.
Only a few weeks later, we learned that cherry trees actually were being removed as part of a project to stabilize and rebuild the aging seawall surrounding the Tidal Basin. That unexpected twist prompted us to update the original blog, noting that reality had begun to resemble fiction. Seen here.
Now, on July 2, 2026, another unexpected development has surfaced. Reports indicate that plans for a major redesign of the historic East Potomac Golf Links—championed by President Donald Trump—could require the removal of Washington’s oldest grove of cherry trees to make way for a championship golf course. According to published reports, preliminary design plans appear to eliminate the century-old grove along with other public recreational features, although the proposal is already facing legal challenges and has not yet received all required approvals.
It makes one wonder if April Fools’ Day simply arrived three months early. What began as a joke has twice been followed by headlines that sounded remarkably similar. Sometimes the hardest stories to believe are the ones that eventually become real.
George Washington never cut down a cherry tree. The story says that when confronted, he told his father, “I cannot lie.”
Whether the tale is true or not, it has long symbolized the value Americans once hoped to see in their leaders: honesty.
The current occupant of the office appears to have little difficulty doing both—cutting down the proverbial cherry tree and denying it afterward—without so much as a whisper of objection from many of his political peers!
[Information for portions of this report was found at LGBTQ NATION. Providing an undeniable and outstanding service to the LGBTQI+ Community!]
July is when the music has stopped, the flags are folded away, and we ask: Who carried us here?
That is where Gregory Marks comes in.
“I’ve always been out,” Gregory Marks once said. “I didn’t have a dramatic reveal or a tortured confession. I was simply a fat queer kid who knew exactly who he was.”
June has ended.
The parades have passed.
The rainbow flags that fluttered in storefront windows and along city streets are being folded and stored away until next year.
And that is exactly why I wanted to write about Gregory Marks.
Because some people do their greatest work when the crowds have gone home.
Gregory Marks spent decades singing with and alongside members of the LGBTQ community, helping people endure grief that many outside the community never witnessed. He was there when AIDS was stealing friends, lovers, brothers, and sons. He was there when funerals came too often and hope seemed in short supply. Music became his ministry. His voice became a refuge.
He was part of a generation that understood something profound:
Sometimes people cannot speak their grief.
But they can sing it.
The LGBTQ movement has always had its celebrated leaders. We know the names of activists who marched, politicians who legislated, and pioneers who challenged unjust laws.
But there are also people like Gregory Marks.
The caretakers.
The listeners.
The singers.
The ones who sat beside hospital beds.
The ones who attended memorials when families would not.
The ones who stood shoulder to shoulder with a hurting community and quietly said:
“You are not alone.”
The history of LGBTQ choirs and musical organizations is deeply intertwined with survival. Groups such as the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus became places where people could grieve together, celebrate together, and declare openly who they were in a world that often wished they would disappear. Music became protest. Music became healing. Music became hope.
That is Gregory Marks’ legacy.
Not merely the songs he sang.
But the people he helped carry through unbearable moments.
I think there is a lesson in that.
Pride Month is important.
The rainbow flag matters.
Celebration matters.
But perhaps what matters most is what happens on July 1st.
When the banners come down.
When the headlines move on.
When ordinary people continue doing extraordinary things for one another.
That is where love proves itself.
Not in the applause.
Not in the parade.
But in the quiet decision to stand beside another person and help them carry what feels too heavy to bear.
Why Pride Month, the rainbow flag, and the simple act of being seen still matter.
There are moments when people ask a sincere question:
Why is there a Pride Month? Why the rainbow flag? Why all of the celebration?
For many people, the answer is simple.
Because there are still nights when someone leaves a restaurant holding the hand of the person they love and wonders if they will make it home safely.
Recently in the small city of Caldwell, a gay couple, Juan Olvera and Eric Reed, say they were enjoying dinner at a local restaurant when they became the target of homophobic slurs from a group of men. The couple left, hoping to avoid confrontation. Instead, they say they were followed, chased through a parking lot and onto nearby railroad tracks, and assaulted. One man suffered a black eye, cuts, and bruises. The other required stitches after being struck in the face. Police arrested one suspect and filed a misdemeanor battery charge. Idaho law does not currently include sexual orientation among its hate crime protections.
The physical wounds will heal.
The fear takes longer.
Juan Olvera told reporters:
“I literally thought I was going to die.”
Think about that sentence.
Not in a war.
Not while committing a crime.
Not while threatening anyone.
But simply because he was gay.
And that is why Pride exists.
The rainbow flag is not a declaration of superiority.
It is not a political party.
It is not an attack on anyone else’s beliefs.
It is a signal.
It says:
I am here.
I have survived.
I should not have to hide.
I deserve to live openly and safely.
For some people, Pride is a parade.
For others, it is a quiet acknowledgment that they made it through years of fear, rejection, ridicule, or violence.
Many older LGBTQ Americans remember when they could lose jobs for being gay.
They remember being denied housing.
They remember police raids on bars.
They remember the terror of the AIDS epidemic.
And yes, they remember the beatings.
The rainbow became a symbol because symbols matter.
Flags matter.
They tell stories.
The American flag tells the story of a nation striving toward liberty.
The rainbow flag tells the story of people striving toward dignity.
Neither promises perfection.
Both represent hope.
This story from Idaho is not offered to inflame anger or divide people further.
It is offered as a reminder.
Behind every Pride flag is a person.
Behind every Pride Month celebration is someone who once wondered whether they would be accepted by their family, their church, their community—or even survive.
Most people, regardless of politics, agree on one thing:
No one should fear violence because of who they are.
No one should be beaten for holding the hand of the person they love.
No one should have to wonder whether tomorrow will bring acceptance or hatred.
That is not a gay issue.
That is a human issue.
And until stories like this become relics of the past rather than headlines of the present, there will continue to be Pride Month.
There will continue to be rainbow flags.
There will continue to be people saying:
We are here. We are your neighbors. We are your family. And we hope one day these reminders are no longer necessary.
If you lived in Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas, and Arizona, or you have ever worked in law enforcement and journalism, and or spent countless hours on the road—there is a very human story you have told your family. It is centered around the time you have spent on America’s highways, roads and streets.
The Roads That Built America
This is not a story about concrete. It is a story about:
The families who moved west.
The truckers who kept shelves stocked.
The police officers who worked accidents at 3 a.m.
The soldiers who came home.
The diners, motels, and gas stations that became landmarks.
And the millions of ordinary Americans who chased jobs, love, and dreams on ribbons of pavement stretching to the horizon.
The Plan: A network of roads would be built unlike anything the world had ever seen—highways stretching from coast to coast, linking farms to cities, deserts to mountains, and ordinary people to extraordinary possibilities.
The Roads That Built America
On June 29, 1956, America made a promise to itself.
It wasn’t spoken from a church pulpit.
It wasn’t etched into a monument.
It was signed into law.
A network of roads would be built unlike anything the world had ever seen—highways stretching from coast to coast, linking farms to cities, deserts to mountains, and ordinary people to extraordinary possibilities.
Seventy years later, those roads are so common we barely notice them.
But think for a moment about what they have witnessed.
Young soldiers returning home.
Loyd “Bick” Bickerstaff a former Oklahoma Highway Patrolman and Elk City Police Captain. Arrested the worst of the worst, the famous and hometown folks “driving like hell” on Route 66. Living to tell his stories to Life Magazine in 1983. He said then, “I had the front seat to best show on earth!” Click on image for “Bick’s Story!”
Families piling into station wagons for summer vacations.
Truck drivers hauling everything from oranges to automobiles.
Teenagers leaving their hometowns for the first time.
Police officers racing toward emergencies.
And people like me.
I have traveled these roads in uniform and out of it.
I have driven them in sunshine and storms.
I’ve seen tragedy beside them and joy because of them.
The interstate is more than concrete.
It is memory.
It is movement.
It is America in motion.
Somewhere tonight, a grandfather is telling his grandchildren about the days before air conditioning in cars.
Somewhere, a truck driver is crossing the desert under a blanket of stars.
Somewhere, a young couple is heading west, hoping for a better life.
The roads connect all of us.
Ike’s Highways – Click for more information.
They have for seventy years.
And long after we’re gone, they’ll continue carrying the hopes of people we will never meet.
That may be the greatest achievement of all.
Not that America built the highways.
But that the highways helped build America.
There is time to put an old myth to rest.
There is an old story that has been passed from one generation to the next.
Many Americans grew up hearing that when the Interstate Highway System was built, portions of the roads had to be constructed in straight one- or two-mile stretches so military aircraft could land in an emergency. Others remember hearing it as “one mile out of every five.”
It is a fascinating story.
And like many stories, there is a grain of truth hidden inside.
From Coast to Coast and Border to Border. Click on image.
The Interstate system was officially named the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways for a reason. President Eisenhower had seen firsthand the importance of transportation during World War II. The military wanted a road network that could rapidly move troops, equipment, and supplies across the country.
But there was never a federal requirement that highways include straight stretches for aircraft landings.
Still, the idea refuses to disappear.
Perhaps because it speaks to something larger.
America built these roads not just for vacations and commerce, but for resilience. They were conceived during the Cold War, when the nation was thinking about defense, mobility, and what might happen in a national emergency.
And while fighter jets may never have been intended to touch down on every highway, millions of Americans have landed on these roads at important moments in their lives.
Soldiers coming home.
Families moving west.
Truckers delivering the necessities of everyday life.
Young people leaving their hometowns to begin something new.
Somewhere tonight, headlights are cutting through the darkness on a road built seventy years ago… carrying someone toward a story they’ll tell for the rest of their life.
The highways became runways of another kind.
Places where ordinary people took off into the future.
This Story Originally Appeared On November 1st, 2025. On November 26th a shooting resulted in Washington D.C. It looks as if it resulted from pressure placed on an individual. A person identified from a sect or community. You can read the story connected to that event here. then consider the contents of this story and decide for yourself. It is not difficult to have predicted. More will come.
10–16 minutes
In every generation, the United States stands at a crossroads of its own making. From the outside, our country can look unstoppable. From the inside, we often feel the push and pull of competing values. These include hopes and fears. Beneath the headlines and politics are real people—neighbors, families, workers—trying to live meaningful lives. When pressure builds in a society, it rarely announces itself with fanfare. Instead, it creeps in quietly, showing up as worry, disconnection, or a sense that something familiar is shifting. This story isn’t about sensational headlines but about those quiet pressures—economic, social, and cultural—that can change a nation’s future.
Deportation, Prejudice, and the Risk of History Repeating
When governments treat specific communities as disposable, they create wounds. These often fester into something more dangerous. Today in the United States, many Hispanic families live under the shadow of deportation. They are sometimes sent to countries that are not their place of origin. Worse still, many are denied fair hearings or meaningful access to justice before being removed.
This pattern, though uniquely American in its details, has historical echoes elsewhere.
Lessons from Israel and Its Neighbors
Globally, people are voicing similar worries. Inflation, poverty, unemployment, and corruption rank highest worldwide. Local details differ, yet the underlying pressures on ordinary families are strikingly alike from one country to another.
In the Middle East, decades of restrictive policies have shaped the relationship between Israel and its neighbors. Palestinians have endured travel restrictions, settlement expansion, home demolitions, and barriers to full participation in civic life. While not every individual responds with violence, these systemic grievances have fueled a climate where radical groups gain traction. Street shootings, bombings, and attacks on innocent civilians are, in part, the tragic outcome of exclusion and marginalization.
When justice is denied, resentment grows. History shows us what happens when exclusion takes root. Will the U.S. repeat Israel’s mistakes?
The lesson is not that oppression always leads to terrorism. Yet, when large communities feel silenced, denied justice, or stripped of dignity, it becomes easier for extremism to take root.
The American Parallel
For many Hispanic communities in the U.S., there is growing concern that the same cycle begins here. Families who have lived in this country for years are uprooted without warning. Children who know no other homeland are deported to countries where they have no ties. Legal safeguards that should guarantee fairness are often bypassed through expedited removal or administrative shortcuts.
Deportation without dignity doesn’t just break families—it risks breaking society. Lessons from abroad show what happens when whole communities are silenced.
The danger is not only humanitarian—it is practical. Alienation breeds resentment. Resentment, left unchecked, can lead to anger that is so strong it erupts in harmful ways. If citizens and residents consistently feel betrayed by the very government meant to protect them, feelings of betrayal grow. Over time, these feelings lead to instability akin to that seen in other parts of the world.
A Cautionary Reflection
The United States faces a choice. It can double down on policies that treat Hispanic people as outsiders. Alternatively, it can recognize that fairness, dignity, and due process are not luxuries—they are stabilizers. By ensuring justice and compassion, the U.S. can protect both its people and its principles.
History reminds us that exclusion never produces lasting peace. Inclusion does. If America forgets this, it risks repeating a painful lesson already written across borders far from its own.
Exclusion never creates peace. Inclusion does. The United States must choose which future it wants.
As this report was being prepared on September 10, 2025. Conservative activist Charlie Kirk was fatally shot during a speaking event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. He was addressing an audience as part of his “American Comeback Tour.” When a gunman, described as wearing tactical gear, opened fire from a nearby building. The event was not just violent in its outcome. It’s now being discussed widely as an example of how political tensions, rising polarization. Public rhetoric can set the stage for tragedy. AP News+3Reuters+3People.com+3
This shooting stands as a stark reminder of what happens when communities feel threatened, unheard, or unfairly treated. When specific policies—like deportations without fair hearings, rhetoric that pits “us vs. them,” or laws that strip rights from people—are merged with public disdain, alienation can grow. As with Kirk’s death, violence doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It is often preceded by months or years of escalating division, distrust, and dehumanizing language toward some group.
If similar pressures continue—where people feel they are being denied justice. Or they will be forced into exile, or silenced—the risk is not only that isolated individuals will lash out. More of these attacks will spill into public spaces, become more common, and target more people. Charlie Kirk’s shooting is tragic and shocking. Still it also foreshadows a pattern we’ve seen before elsewhere: oppression + exclusion + inflammatory rhetoric = violence.
THE QUESTION NOW FACING THE UNITED STATES
The U.S. be trailing a path? Is government policy and public rhetoric pushing some communities to a breaking point? Exclusion and injustice be more than grievances, becoming catalysts for violence?
Israel offers a stark example. It shows what can happen when a nation attempts to dominate or control another people or region. Despite decades of military action, surveillance, imprisonment, and harsh policies, the country faces ongoing terrorist attacks. These actions occur within its own borders. History shows that no matter the tactics, attempts to subjugate or marginalize an entire population often breed resentment. Such approaches lead to cycles of violence rather than lasting security.
Recent polling reveals Americans’ top worries focus on daily life basics. These include the economy, healthcare costs, inflation, and Social Security. Economic anxiety has become the leading stress point—and understanding it is key to shaping effective public policy.
In the United States, millions of people belong to the LGBTQI community—transgender, gay, intersex, and beyond. If laws or court rulings increasingly target these groups with discriminatory restrictions or hardships, the effect won’t just be legal. It will erode their existing rights and impact them deeply on a human level. People who feel cornered, threatened, or stripped of dignity often turn to protest, activism, and self-defense. Families, friends, and allies of LGBTQI individuals will stand with them. History shows that when marginalized communities are pushed too far, their collective response grows stronger. They become more determined, whether through the courts, the ballot box, or public action.
There are case studies in why inclusion and fairness matter. Disenfranchisement can occur across many lines. These include ethnicity, religion, gender, disability, or economic status. Prevention starts with recognizing early warning signs. It involves pushing for fairness and empathy. Other groups and individuals will be targeted in this sweeping of Americans’ rights.
1. Immigrant and Refugee Communities Beyond Latin America
People from African nations, the Middle East, or Asia sometimes experience parallel challenges. They face deportation, limited due process, and suspicion tied to their nationality or religion. Policies that reduce refugee admissions, delay asylum processing, or tighten visa rules disproportionately affect them.
2. Religious Minorities
Muslims, Sikhs, Jews, and other smaller faith groups have seen spikes in harassment or targeted legislation. Surveillance, mosque or temple zoning battles, and hate crimes all increase when public rhetoric frames these groups as”others.”
3. Indigenous Peoples
Tribal communities continue to face legal battles over land, water, and sovereignty. Changes to federal protections or environmental rules can undermine their rights. This fuels deep distrust and potential standoffs (for example, Standing Rock and other pipeline protests).
4. People With Disabilities
Budget cuts or shifts in healthcare, accessibility regulations, or education funding can affect people with physical or cognitive disabilities. Without legal protections and enforcement, they risk losing access to accommodations and services they depend on.
5. Women and Reproductive Rights
If policies continue restricting reproductive healthcare and bodily autonomy, many women feel increasingly alienated. This is especially true for those in rural and low-income areas. Such feelings lead to organized protest. It also heightens tensions.
6. Workers in Precarious or Gig Jobs
With unions weakened and worker protections often rolled back, low-wage and gig-economy workers are also vulnerable to systemic neglect. Economic insecurity can create fertile ground for unrest, especially if merged with racial or immigration-related grievances.
On a hot summer’s day, if you stir any of these pots, something unhappy will happen. Similarly, if you keep someone locked out on a cold winter’s day, the outcome will be negative. It used to be the explosive reaction we referred to as Cabin-Fever when someone no longer can take the pressure. When so many groups are pushed to the point of not being capable to handle it. What happens? America already has more firearms than any country in the world. It shouldn’t take much research to realize that becoming Palestine-Israel would be easier than ever. It would also be more violent than people thought.
Exclusion never creates peace. Inclusion does. America must choose which future it wants.
There are Americans who are also to be considered part of the LGBTQI community. If laws or Supreme Court rulings turn against the transgender, Gay members, or Intersex community, these laws can cause hardships. Further restrictions can come into their lives. At some point, they and their families, friends, and supporters are going to find ways to defend themselves.
Yes — beyond the Hispanic and LGBTQI communities already discussed, there are several other groups. Experts and advocates often recognize these groups as vulnerable. These groups are often affected by shifts in policy, public sentiment, or legal rulings. Here’s a quick overview:
How Many Transgender People Have Been Mass Shooters?
This chart shows just how rare transgender or nonbinary mass shooters are in the U.S.—less than 1% of cases compared to an overwhelming majority by cisgender men. It’s a clear reminder that public narratives blaming LGBTQ+ people for mass violence are unsupported by facts.
How many trans shooters are there in real life?
Officially, the short answer: very, very few. Credible databases don’t systematically record gender identity. Still, the best available analyses show well under 1% of U.S. mass shooters have identified as transgender or nonbinary—i.e., only a handful of cases across many decades. Social Sciences and Humanities College+1
A few notes for context:
The Violence Project’s long-running database (public mass shootings, 4+ killed) shows hundreds of incidents since 1966. Researchers and fact-checks confirm that transgender perpetrators account for less than 1% of cases. This is in the low single digits in total. The Violence Project+1
News reporting that tries to tally specific incidents similarly finds just a few cases. It also cautions that many official datasets code by sex, not gender identity, which limits precision. Newsweek
Independent fact-checks conclude that claims of a “rise” in transgender mass shooters are unsupported. The vast majority of mass shooters are cisgender men. Reuters
Bottom line: Exact counts are hard to pin down because of data limitations. The evidence consistently shows that transgender people make up a vanishingly small share of U.S. mass shooters.
“Fewer than ten transgender athletes out of 510,000 NCAA players.
Yet, they’re at the center of a multi-million-dollar political storm.”
This makes sense—transgender people represent a very small part of the population, and their visibility often makes them targets. Out of more than 510,000 NCAA college athletes nationwide, it’s estimated that fewer than ten are openly transgender. Historically, families—including our grandparents and their grandparents—have coexisted with transgender individuals without controversy. Only in recent years have political attacks escalated, turning a once-private aspect of life into a public battleground. These attacks have generated hundreds of millions of dollars. Groups and politicians use transgender people as a wedge issue. They target individuals who are simply trying to live their lives.
What We Know (or Think We Know)
According to the Williams Institute at UCLA, about 300,000 youth aged 13–17 recognize as transgender in the U.S. Williams Institute
Of those, some studies suggest ~40.7% of transgender high school students play on at least one sports team. Applying that to the population estimate gives around 120,000+ transgender high school student-athletes Williams Institute
Nonetheless, when it comes to more specific breakdowns (e.g. how many play in women’s teams, or how many are in college/pro sports), the numbers are much smaller. For example, GLAAD reports that among ~510,000 NCAA college athletes, there are fewer than 10 known transgender athletesGLAAD
Key Takeaways & Limitations
Small in relative terms: Tens of thousands of transgender youth join in high school sports. Still, they are still a very tiny fraction of all athletes.
Very few at higher levels: At the college or professional levels, the known, openly transgender athletes are very rare (under 10 in the NCAA among all those athletes, per recent reports) GLAAD+1
Data gaps: Many sports associations don’t track gender identity carefully. Privacy concerns, inconsistent reporting, and changing eligibility rules make precise numbers hard to nail down.
Exclusion never creates peace. Inclusion does. The United States must choose which future it wants.
Yet even in times of strain, The United States of America greatest strength has always been its capacity to self-correct. Communities do not simply absorb pressure—they also adapt, innovate, and rise to meet challenges. We have the chance now to choose empathy over division, solutions over rhetoric, and inclusion over exclusion. If we remember that the country’s heart beats strongest when its people are treated with fairness and dignity. Then the same forces that threaten to divide us can also become the sparks that unite us. This is not just a warning—it’s an invitation to hope.
This content was originally intended to be posted on September 11, 2025. Due to unfolding events at that time, its publication was postponed until November 1, 2025. It is reposted on June 26, 2026 due to the current decisions of the United States Supreme Court. The research began weeks before events on September 10, 2025 in Utah. If additional events have occurred since then, this report reflects the level of concern. It highlights the growing sense of unease emerging across the United States.
About the Author:
Benjamin Groff is a former police officer and radio news anchor. He has hosted programs for CNN and ABC News affiliates in Colorado and Wyoming. His career in law enforcement began in 1980 and lasted more than two decades. This gave him firsthand insight into the criminal mind and public safety. Moreover, it provided him with an understanding of the human stories that often go untold. His writing draws on these experiences, blending street-level truth with a journalist’s eye for the bigger picture.
James Talarico is a Presbyterian seminarian running for the U.S. Senate in Texas, and his comments about Christianity have ignited a fierce debate.
James Talarico is a Presbyterian seminarian running for the U.S. Senate in Texas
The controversy began after Talarico told comedian and host Stephen Colbert that Jesus never explicitly mentioned abortion or same-sex marriage in the Gospels. The reaction from some conservative commentators was immediate and intense.
Podcaster Benny Johnson accused him of distorting Christianity. A host on Newsmax questioned his interpretation of scripture. Even Riley Moore suggested on a political program that Talarico’s views were spiritually dangerous.
Yet the passages Talarico cites are among the most familiar in the Bible.
In Matthew 22, Jesus summarizes the law with two commands: love God and love your neighbor. In Matthew 25, he speaks of feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, welcoming strangers, caring for the sick, and visiting prisoners.
These are not obscure verses tucked away in scripture. They are central teachings, repeated in sermons, printed on church walls, and taught to generations of Christians.
For Talarico, these passages point toward a simple but profound idea: that society is measured by how it treats those who are vulnerable—the poor, the sick, the imprisoned, and the outsider.
Others disagree with his political conclusions or argue that Christian teachings encompass a broader set of moral issues. That disagreement is not new. American politics has long wrestled with competing interpretations of faith and public life.
What makes this moment notable is how intensely the argument has become personal.
Critics accuse Talarico of misrepresenting Christianity. Supporters argue he is reminding people of teachings they believe have been overshadowed by political battles.
Whatever side one takes, the underlying questions remain:
Who gets to define the role of faith in public life?
What teachings deserve the greatest emphasis?
And can political movements built around religious identity tolerate interpretations that challenge their assumptions?
These are not questions that will be settled in a television interview, a podcast, or a campaign speech.
But they are questions Americans continue to ask.
And the verses themselves remain where they have always been—waiting in the pages of scripture, inviting each reader to decide what they mean and how they should be lived.
Meanwhile –
Ted Cruz said James Talarico isn’t “masculine,” and Talarico answered with a list of what real men never do. The smear came Monday on Fox News, where Cruz declared that if you were making a list of 1,000 adjectives to describe the Texas Democrat, “masculine” would not be one of them, then added that a stiff breeze would blow him over like a feather.
The attack was not a one-off. Since Talarico won the Democratic nomination and pulled ahead of Ken Paxton in the polls, the Republican machine has gone all in on manhood.
Paxton called him “too low-T for Texas.” White House aide Stephen Miller falsely claimed Democrats had nominated “their first transgender senate candidate,” a lie about a man who is neither transgender nor, for the record, the vegan they also keep insisting he is.
None of it touches his actual record. That is the point.
On MS NOW with Jen Psaki on Thursday, Talarico took the question head on, and he answered it with a lawn mower.
He told the story of Mark Talarico, the adoptive father who gave him his last name.
Every Saturday morning, rain or shine, whether he wanted to or not, his dad mowed the family’s lawn. Then, without anyone asking, he walked next door and mowed the lawn of their neighbor, an elderly widow.
He never talked about it. He just did it.
That, Talarico said, is what a man does.
A man takes responsibility. A man upholds his commitments to his family and his neighbors. A man does what’s right even when no one is watching.
Then came the other half. “They don’t lie and cheat their way through life. They don’t sell their soul to the highest bidder. They don’t steal from other people in order to enrich themselves.”
Real men serve others, he said. Weak men serve themselves. And he closed the door on his way out: he doesn’t think Ken Paxton or Ted Cruz are in a position to tell anybody what a real man is.
The list reads differently considering who it was aimed at.
Cruz spent 2016 watching Donald Trump publicly mock his wife’s appearance, then endorsed him and became one of his most loyal soldiers.
When a deadly winter storm froze Texas in 2021, Cruz boarded a flight to Cancun.
Paxton was impeached on bribery and corruption charges by his own Republican colleagues in the Texas House, and his wife filed for divorce last year citing adultery.
Mark Talarico never talked about the widow’s lawn. He just mowed it. Some men do what’s right when no one is watching.
What if the biggest force in American politics isn’t ideology, but exhaustion?
“Do They Expect Me To Believe This?”
Every election cycle seems to arrive with the promise that this one will finally settle things.
It never does.
The arguments continue. The accusations continue. The campaigns never seem to end.
And yet, beneath the daily headlines, another possibility may be emerging.
What if the next major political movement in America isn’t driven by the far left or the far right?
What if it is driven by people who are simply tired?
Tired of being angry.
Tired of being told to hate neighbors who vote differently.
“God, he’s doing it again!”
Tired of waking up every morning to discover another crisis demanding immediate outrage.
For nearly a decade, American politics has been fueled by conflict. Political strategists understand something that television networks and social media platforms have learned as well: outrage captures attention.
Anger keeps viewers watching.
Fear keeps voters engaged.
Conflict generates clicks.
But there is evidence that many Americans may be reaching a saturation point.
“Again, with that?”
Poll after poll has shown declining trust in institutions, political parties, media organizations, and government itself. Yet beneath that distrust may be something more important: a desire for normalcy.
History suggests that political pendulums rarely stop at the extremes.
Eventually voters begin looking for stability.
Not excitement.
“AHH! No more pop up political ads!”
Not revolution.
Not constant crisis.
Just stability.
The nation has seen similar periods before. Following years of upheaval, Americans have often sought leaders who promised calm rather than confrontation. Sometimes those leaders succeeded. Sometimes they did not. But the desire itself repeatedly emerged.
Could that happen again?
No one knows.
It just never ends…
Political forecasting has become a risky business. Recent elections have repeatedly surprised experts from every perspective.
But one possibility seems worth considering.
The next political shift may not be a movement toward one party or another.
It may be a movement away from perpetual conflict.
Americans may begin rewarding candidates who spend less time attacking opponents and more time discussing solutions.
They may become less interested in political celebrities and more interested in competent managers.
They may become less concerned with winning arguments and more concerned with lowering costs, improving schools, strengthening infrastructure, and maintaining public safety.
If that happens, the political landscape could change rapidly.
Not because voters changed their beliefs.
But because they changed their priorities.
Perhaps the most important question facing the nation is not whether America will become more conservative or more progressive.
“Please just let me drive to work in peace”
It may be whether Americans decide they are simply exhausted by the constant fight.
And if enough people reach that point, the next great political movement could be something surprisingly rare in modern politics:
A movement toward peace, practicality, and common ground.
The future remains uncertain.
But if history teaches anything, it is that voters eventually tire of turmoil.
The question is whether that moment is approaching once again.
Why the Future of Democracy Belongs to People, Not Boundaries
~~~~ ### ~~~~
Politicians have spent generations arguing over maps.
I Want You To Vote In This Election!
Every decade, after the national census is completed, district lines are redrawn across America. Lawsuits follow. Editorials are written. Citizens attend hearings. Political parties accuse one another of manipulating boundaries for advantage.
The debate is as old as the nation itself.
Yet amid all the arguments over lines, colors, and voting precincts, one reality is often overlooked:
Maps are temporary. People are not.
Throughout American history, those who sought to shape political power frequently focused on geography. But the forces that have transformed America have rarely originated from a mapmaker’s desk.
They came from ordinary people moving toward opportunity.
When millions of Americans headed west in the nineteenth century, the political balance of the nation changed.
When African Americans left the South during the Great Migration and settled in northern and western cities, political power shifted.
Photo by Edmond Dantu
When industries rose and fell, populations followed jobs. When housing boomed, communities expanded. When retirees sought warmer climates, entire states gained influence in Congress.
None of those transformations were directed by district boundaries. They were driven by human decisions. The lesson remains relevant today.
Political maps may influence elections for a period of time. They can affect which candidates run, how campaigns are conducted, and which communities are grouped together. Courts have recognized that district boundaries matter because representation matters.
Yet history repeatedly demonstrates that no map remains powerful forever.
A Current Example
The principle can be seen even in recent voter registration data.
According to figures released by the Maricopa County Arizona Elections Office, during the month of May, registered Democrats in Maricopa County increased by 516 voters, while registered Republicans declined by 1,772 voters.
Whether those numbers represent a temporary fluctuation or the beginning of a longer trend remains to be seen. Political fortunes often rise and fall from one election cycle to the next.
What the figures do demonstrate, however, is that political landscapes are never frozen in place.
Photo by Sora Shimazaki
Every month, people move into communities. Others move away. Some voters change their party affiliation. Young citizens register for the first time. Others choose to become independents. The electorate is constantly evolving.
That reality reinforces a lesson that history has repeatedly taught: no political map remains static because the people living within those boundaries do not remain static.
The balance of political influence can change not only because district lines are redrawn, but because citizens themselves continue to reshape the communities in which they live.
New families move in.
Young people reach voting age.
Businesses open and close.
The reality is that political change does not always come from manipulation, conspiracy, or wrongdoing. More often, it comes from the natural ebb and flow of society itself.
Neighborhoods change.
Communities grow.
And eventually, political assumptions that once seemed permanent begin to disappear.
America’s political history is filled with examples of districts, counties, and states that once voted overwhelmingly one way before shifting in entirely different directions a generation later.
The reason is simple.
Maps may define where votes are counted.
People determine how those votes are cast.
That distinction is important because it reminds us where the true power of democracy resides.
Not in the pen of a mapmaker.
Not in a legislative chamber.
Not even in a courtroom.
Ultimately, democracy survives because citizens continue to participate.
A district line may influence a contest.
A voter influences the outcome.
One line exists on paper.
The other exists in reality.
Closing Thought
Photo by Rosemary Ketchum
The history of America suggests that every political map comes with an expiration date.
Population growth, migration, economic opportunity, and generational change eventually reshape communities in ways no cartographer can fully predict.
Political boundaries may guide representation for a time.
But the future has always belonged to the people who live within them.The reality is that political change does not always come from manipulation, conspiracy, or wrongdoing. More often, it comes from the natural ebb and flow of society itself.
Political maps may define where votes are counted. But people determine how those votes are cast. And as Maricopa County’s own voter registration figures demonstrate, the makeup of the electorate is changing every day—regardless of where the lines on the map happen to fall. And that may be the most democratic truth of all.
Your Right To Vote Is An Opportunity Others Never Get!
People move. Communities grow. Generations change. New voters enter the system while others leave it behind. These tides of change have shaped American politics since the nation’s founding.
Not everyone accepts the outcome when elections produce results they did not expect. In fact, disputes over election results are nothing new. Since the closely contested 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore, which ultimately required intervention by the Supreme Court, questions, challenges, and objections have become a recurring feature of national political life regardless of which party prevailed.
Yet the strength of democracy has never rested on unanimous agreement. It rests on the willingness of citizens to participate, to make their voices heard, and to continue engaging in the process even when the outcome is not the one they hoped for.
Maps can be redrawn. Political fortunes can rise and fall. But democracy endures because the people themselves continue to shape its future
According to comments posted by citizens following his passing, concerns have been raised that local Oklahoma news media largely overlooked the public service of former Oklahoma City Council member and Acting Mayor Guy Liebmann.
Groff Media reviewed coverage from Oklahoma City’s three major television news outlets—News 9, KOCO 5, and KFOR—as well as Oklahoma’s largest newspaper, The Oklahoman. Aside from a death notice appearing in paid obituary advertising space, we found little or no reporting recognizing Liebmann’s years of service to Oklahoma City and the State of Oklahoma.
Whether this reflects changing news priorities or simply an oversight, it has prompted some residents to question why a public servant who devoted decades to civic leadership received so little attention from the institutions that regularly document the history of the community he served.
Unlike that situation. Groff Media will recognize the individual.
Liebmann died on June 8, 2026, leaving behind a legacy of public service that stretched from the Oklahoma City Council to the Oklahoma House of Representatives and included a brief but significant period as Oklahoma City’s acting mayor.
Born in Shawnee on April 27, 1936, Liebmann graduated from Oklahoma City’s Classen High School before earning a degree in business management from the University of Oklahoma. He later served as an officer in the United States Marine Corps before entering a successful career in real estate and investments.
Many Oklahomans may remember Liebmann best for his service on the Oklahoma City Council representing Ward 8. In November 2003, following the resignation of Mayor Kirk Humphreys, Liebmann was appointed acting mayor and guided the city until voters elected Mick Cornett in March 2004.
Though his time as mayor lasted only a few months, it came during an important chapter in Oklahoma City’s development. The city was continuing its transformation into a nationally recognized metropolitan area, and Liebmann helped provide stability during a period of leadership transition.
During his service on the council and as acting mayor, Liebmann worked with several important city organizations, including the Oklahoma City Water Trust, the Convention and Visitors Bureau, and the Oklahoma City Fairgrounds Trust.
After leaving City Hall, Liebmann continued his public service by representing House District 82 in the Oklahoma House of Representatives from 2005 through 2013.
His public career reflected a belief that local government matters. While many political careers are measured by headlines and controversy, Liebmann’s legacy was built largely through committee work, civic involvement, and a willingness to serve when called upon.
Today, Oklahoma City residents drive roads, utilize services, and enjoy civic improvements that were influenced by the efforts of countless local officials whose names rarely appear in history books. Guy Liebmann was one of those individuals.
As news of his passing spreads, Oklahomans have an opportunity to remember a generation of civic leaders who dedicated years of their lives to public service, often with little recognition beyond the communities they served.
Funeral arrangements have been entrusted to Smith & Kernke Funeral Directors in Oklahoma City. At the time of publication, the funeral home reported that memorial service details were still pending and would be announced when finalized.
Pre-Trip Medical Evaluation For Politicians Over 70
Prepping Him For The Road Trip
Many physicians recommend a comprehensive health assessment before an extended speaking tour, especially if it involves frequent travel, time zone changes, or multiple appearances.
This might include:
Cardiovascular evaluation
Medication review
Blood work
Sleep assessment
Mobility and fall-risk evaluation
Vaccinations if international travel is involved
Hydration and Nutritional Support
Some physicians may recommend:
Intravenous (IV) hydration before travel if a person is prone to dehydration
Nutritional supplementation if deficiencies are present
Vitamin B12 injections for individuals who are deficient
It’s important to note that “wellness IVs” marketed for energy have limited scientific evidence unless treating a specific deficiency or dehydration.
Voice and Speaking Preparation
For public speakers, clergy, politicians, and entertainers:
Evaluation by an ear, nose, and throat specialist
Voice therapy with a speech-language pathologist
Treatment of acid reflux, which often affects vocal quality
Management of allergies or post-nasal drip
Sleep and Fatigue Management
A physician might:
Screen for sleep apnea
Adjust medications that cause fatigue
Recommend strategies for jet lag and circadian adjustment
Physical Conditioning Programs
Many older speakers benefit from:
Physical therapy
Balance training
Walking and endurance programs
Pulmonary rehabilitation if lung issues exist
Cognitive and Mental Performance
Some individuals undergo:
Cognitive screening
Memory assessments
Stress management training
Performance coaching for public speaking
What Most Public Figures Actually Do
Many older politicians, authors, ministers, professors, and entertainers who travel extensively often receive:
Regular physician monitoring
Scheduled rest days
Physical therapy or exercise coaching
Nutritional guidance
Voice coaching
Strategic scheduling to avoid exhaustion
If You’re Thinking About Someone Around 80 Like A President…And Perhaps Drugs?
If you’re thinking about a public figure in their late 70s or 80s preparing for a speaking circuit, or appearing in public at social events, the most common medical preparation would usually be a thorough physical examination and clearance from their physician, combined with careful management of sleep, hydration, medications, and travel schedules rather than a single special procedure
There are medications that can improve alertness, stamina, concentration, and wakefulness, and some public figures, executives, entertainers, and speakers have used them under medical supervision. However, they are not magic solutions, and for older adults the risks can become significant.
Some examples include:
Modafinil (Provigil) and Armodafinil (Nuvigil) — prescription “wakefulness-promoting” medications originally developed for narcolepsy and other sleep disorders. They can help reduce fatigue and improve alertness.
Traditional stimulants such as amphetamine-based medications and methylphenidate can increase energy and focus but carry greater risks involving blood pressure, heart rate, dependence, and cardiovascular events.
Some physicians may prescribe medications to address underlying causes of fatigue, such as depression, sleep disorders, anemia, hormone deficiencies, or vitamin deficiencies rather than prescribing stimulants directly.
For someone in their late 70s or 80s preparing for a national speaking tour, physicians are often more interested in:
Sleep quality
Hydration
Nutrition
Cardiac health
Medication interactions
Managing jet lag and travel fatigue
Rather than simply giving a stimulant. A healthy 80-year-old can often maintain a surprisingly active schedule with careful medical management and scheduling. That is, if they lay off the Big Macs and KFC deep fried chicken legs.
Historically, there have also been legends and reports about politicians, presidents, candidates, entertainers, and television personalities using various stimulants or wakefulness-promoting medications to keep up with demanding schedules. Unless the person or their physician discloses it, however, there is usually no reliable public evidence of what medications an individual is taking. As in the case of Michael Jackson. Occassionally someone will try to set up someone with planted illegal drugs, especially if there is a grudge of some sort involved.
If you’re wondering how an 80-year-old politician or public figure could maintain a grueling travel and speaking schedule, the answer is usually a combination of:
Medications are used,
Strategic scheduling and rest are monitored through IV applications similar to Jacksons.
Nutrition and hydration is usually abandoned and the person will fall asleep in public.
Exercise and conditioning in some cases are attempted or it has ended a long time ago.
Sometimes medications that improve wakefulness or treat underlying fatigue-causing conditions are used or has been attempted but no longer work.
A healthy 80-year-old can often perform far beyond what many people expect, particularly if they have access to excellent medical care and a carefully managed schedule. If that is not the case. Then there is little hope the individual will be successful in managing their own home little alone the affairs of others.
Presidential Visibility in the Age of Social Media
For most of American history, citizens rarely knew where their president was every hour of every day. News traveled at the speed of newspapers, radio broadcasts, and evening television reports. A president could spend days away from public view without generating much notice.
Missing – “The President of The United States”
Today, that has changed.
In the age of social media, twenty-four-hour news cycles, and instant communication, even a few days without a public appearance can spark speculation. Questions emerge. Rumors spread. Conspiracy theories flourish.
That is exactly what happened recently when President Donald Trump was absent from public view for several days.
The speculation raises a larger question that extends beyond any one president: How much visibility do Americans expect from their leaders, and has that expectation changed with technology?
The discussion becomes even more relevant as America continues electing leaders well into their seventies and eighties. President Trump is approaching 80 years of age. Former President Joe Biden served into his eighties. Other national leaders around the world have governed well beyond what was once considered traditional retirement age.
Age alone does not determine a person’s ability to lead. History is filled with examples of individuals who remained productive, sharp, and influential well into their later years. At the same time, age naturally invites questions about health, stamina, and transparency—questions that would be asked of anyone occupying one of the most demanding jobs on Earth.
Perhaps the real story is not where a president was for a week.
Perhaps the story is how quickly Americans become concerned when they cannot see their president, hear from their president, or receive reassurance that the nation’s business is continuing as usual.
In a nation connected by smartphones, social media feeds, and constant news alerts, visibility has become a form of leadership all its own.
The question for the future may not be whether presidents can work behind closed doors.
It may be whether the American public is still willing to believe they are working when the cameras are turned off.
Deputy U.S. Marshal Chester Finch had never cared for Tuesdays.
Monday at least possessed ambition.
Chester Finch “Chapter One” Riding Into Town Cocked!
Friday had hope.
Saturday had purpose.
Tuesday simply appeared each week without apology and lingered far longer than necessary.
On this particular Tuesday, Finch was seated on the front porch of the federal office in Serenity attempting to determine whether a cloud over the western horizon resembled a horse or a baked potato.
He was leaning toward potato.
That was when the telegraph operator appeared.
The man looked exhausted.
This was unusual.
Telegraph operators generally spent most of their day sitting down.
“Marshal Finch!”
the man shouted.
Finch looked up.
“The federal government again?”
“No.”
“The railroad?”
“No.”
“The widow Patterson’s missing cat?”
“We found that three months ago.”
Finch nodded.
“Good cat.”
The operator handed him a folded telegram.
“It came marked urgent.”
Finch sighed.
Nothing marked urgent had ever improved his day.
He unfolded the paper.
The message was brief.
URGENT.SITUATION OUT OF CONTROL.LOCAL AUTHORITIES OVERWHELMED.REQUEST IMMEDIATE FEDERAL ASSISTANCE.DUSTBUCKET JUNCTION.
There was no signature.
No explanation.
No details whatsoever.
Finch read it twice.
Then once more.
He turned the paper upside down.
Nothing appeared.
“Helpful,”
he muttered.
The operator shifted nervously.
“What do you think it means?”
Finch folded the telegram.
“It means somebody has failed to provide important information.”
The operator nodded.
“That seems fair.”
Finch stood and stretched.
The joints in his back produced sounds generally associated with old furniture.
A small crowd had gathered nearby.
News traveled quickly in Serenity.
Especially news that wasn’t anyone’s business.
“Where you headed, Marshal?”
asked a merchant.
“Dustbucket Junction.”
The merchant’s face paled.
A woman gasped.
One man removed his hat.
Another whispered a brief prayer.
Finch frowned.
“What?”
The merchant leaned forward.
“You don’t know?”
“Know what?”
The crowd exchanged nervous looks.
Nobody answered.
Finally an old rancher spoke.
“I heard things.”
“What things?”
The rancher lowered his voice.
“Strange things.”
Finch waited.
The rancher swallowed hard.
“Bird things.”
Silence followed.
Finch blinked.
The rancher nodded solemnly.
“Bird things.”
Finch stared for several seconds.
Then he carefully placed the telegram into his pocket.
“That is the least useful information I have ever received.”
The crowd nodded.
It was still apparently enough to worry them.
An hour later Finch packed his saddlebags.
By midafternoon he was ready to leave.
He swung a leg over the cherry-red moped.
The beacon light atop the rear luggage rack spun proudly.
The siren gave a short cheerful wail.
Children immediately appeared.
This happened every time.
Finch reached into the basket mounted to the handlebars.
He withdrew several pieces of hard candy.
The children cheered.
The first peppermint struck a fence post.
The second hit a barrel.
The third narrowly missed a passing dog.
The children scattered for cover.
Finch considered the exchange a complete success.
He started the engine.
The little machine coughed.
Sputtered.
Then settled into its familiar puttering rhythm.
The crowd waved.
Finch tipped his hat.
And slowly rolled west toward Dustbucket Junction.
Toward a mystery.
Toward trouble.
Toward something no one seemed willing to explain.
As evening settled across the prairie, a warm wind carried something unusual across the road ahead.
A single feather.
White.
Small.
Harmless.
It drifted lazily through the air and landed on the front fender of the moped.
Finch glanced down at it.
Then continued riding.
Had he looked up, he might have noticed hundreds more feathers drifting on the horizon.
Instead he disappeared into the sunset.
Completely unaware that Dustbucket Junction was waiting.
And that somewhere ahead, a group of mothercluckers was preparing to make history.
To Be Continued…
Tomorrow: Chapter Two — “Dustbucket Junction”
Deputy U.S. Marshal Chester Finch arrives in town and discovers that whatever has frightened the citizens is unlike anything he has encountered before. The Mayor is missing. The sheriff is hiding. And something appears to be occupying Main Street. The Mayor appears to have been plucked right off Main Street!
