Published: November 21, 2007 02:07 pm      

It’s time to be thankful

In over 30 years in the newspaper business, I have never written a Thanksgiving column. This year, though, the timing just seems right.

Like everybody, I guess I’ve had plenty to be thankful for over the years. I’ve got two great kids, I’ve been to see a doctor maybe twice in the past 35 years, and there haven’t been many days since I got out of college when I didn’t look forward to going to work.

But as 2007 winds down, I seem to have a few more things to look back on — and forward to — this year and give thanks.

I might as well start with the trivial stuff:

• The Green Bay Packers and San Diego Chargers are both simultaneously leading their divisions for one of the few times (maybe the only time) in my 40-plus years as a fan of both teams. As a kid, I lived and died with the Packers through more good years than bad, and I really didn’t have high expectations this season, with an aging quarterback, no running game and a group of mostly young receivers. But Brett Favre must have a fountain of youth in his back yard, the receivers and running game have been much better than expected, and the Green Bay defense is one of the best in the NFC. The Packers are 9-1 and can all but wrap up the NFC North with a victory over the Lions today in the first meaningful Thanksgiving game played in Detroit in decades, and they play Dallas a week from today in a game that could decide home field throughout the NFC playoffs. San Diego, meanwhile, is only 5-5 this season after a 14-2 campaign in 2006 and the bizarre firing of head coach Marty Schottenheimer, but the Chargers have faced one of the NFL’s toughest schedules and have the luxury of playing in what might be the league’s weakest division, the AFC West.

• The New York Yankees re-signed Alex Rodriguez and will probably have him until I’m sitting in diapers and drooling on myself while I watch baseball. My buddy Chris Robbins — still smiling over the second World Series win by his beloved Red Sox in four years — is probably crying, but being the arrogant Boston fan that he is, he also probably believes (foolishly, of course) that the Sawx can beat the Pinstripers with A-Rod or without him.

• I’m not dead last in the AEN football prediction race despite a string of the most gut-wrenching losses in handicapping history. I must have lost a dozen games in the final 30 seconds or overtime this season, while James Myers had been luckier than a pig in slop until he and Leo Kelley both turned in Forrest-like (3-7) efforts last week.

Now for the important things on the list:

• If Jeff Cali wasn’t on his eighth or ninth vacation of the year this week, he could join me in giving thanks for the privilege of working with the best group of players, coaches, administrators and parents in the entire state right here in our coverage area — so I’ll speak for both of us. From Sulphur to Allen and from Konawa to Coalgate, we have some of the toughest small-school competition in the state within a 30-mile radius, and Ada and Byng also give us a chance to see top-notch teams from Classes 5A and 4A. In my three years here, I’ve written about five baseball championships (three by Tupelo and one each by Latta and Roff), two softball titles (the Tupelo girls in the spring of 2006 and the Konawa girls this fall), and one football championship (Sulphur in 2004). I’ve been to state basketball tournaments with teams from Latta, Stonewall, Coalgate and Roff, and I’ve covered dozens of playoff games from here to Oklahoma City. Most importantly, though, the kids we cover seem to know there is a lot more to high school than just sports and a lot more to sports than just winning. Hardly seems like work when the competition — and the kids — are that good.

• I’ve had the pleasure of covering the entire high school careers of an outstanding group of athletes, several of whom I have formed special bonds with during my time in Ada. Tupelo’s Katie Campbell, Cameron Mann and Randy McCurry and Ada’s Michael Roberts, Chaz Daniels and Willie Gould were all impact players as freshmen — and not just in one sport but, in some cases, two or three — when I got here in the fall of 2004, and they will all graduate next spring. Thanks for the memories guys, with a basketball, softball and baseball season still to come for each of you.

• Over the past eight or nine months, I’ve found out just how many friends I really have, not only in Ada but elsewhere. I had a little difficulty early in the year that I thought might have me working somewhere else this Thanksgiving. But because of friends like Chris Robbins, Lone´Beasley, Jeff Cali, Brenda Tollett and others too numerous to mention, I’m still in Ada for another holiday season, and at this point in my life, I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be. I’ve worked at bigger papers in bigger towns, but Ada truly feels like home.

• At first, this item might seem like it should be on the trivial list, but I want to give a special thanks (a) to whomever was responsible for the Konawa softball team getting rained out on Saturday at the state tournament and having to re-schedule for the following week and (b) for not letting us know early enough that the game — originally scheduled for Monday — had been rescheduled again and would be played on Tuesday. Blissfully ignorant of the change, I left early that Monday afternoon to have an early dinner in OKC and arrived at Hall of Fame Stadium to find the place almost deserted. With nothing to do, I cruised over to Remington Park (where I worked for 14 years) and ran into my ex-girlfriend, Donna (a mutuel clerk there since the place opened in 1988), and for the past five weeks or so we’ve been dating again. The future looks pretty good, and not just on the romance front. Donna has one grandson, Jeremy, who is a wide receiver and nose guard for the Oklahoma Outlaws (the runner-up in last weekend’s OKC-area 10-year-old football championship) and another, Tyler, who is a talented singer. I figure down the road I might be looking at concert tickets from Tyler and some choice tickets at the Super Bowl when Jeremy eventually gets there. At my age, it’s always good to plan ahead.

• And as the icing on the Thanksgiving cake (pie?), I’m going to be a grandfather for the first time. My son, Eric and his significant other, Callie, are expecting in May, and they e-mailed me a still from their first ultrasound. Not sure yet what the kid is, but he/she already resembles Grandpa — hard to make out and not in too big a hurry.