Misguided loyalties: An open letter I hope will produce a great cop!

To the young, hopeful police cadet at the public counter:

Young man,

I applaud your desire to be a uniformed police officer. I’m certain – 100% certain – that you are motivated by goodness and for all of the right reasons. I hope that you accept this message with the knowledge that I, and the rest of the community, hope that you become a model public servant at a time we really need model public servants.

First of all, I hope you will believe that you were, in many ways, a victim today.

My Fair Lady; Presenting Mary Cotter

Here's the best reason I could give for you to visit the Los Angeles County Fair this year: Her name is Mary Cotter. She's only 98 years old. I say "only" because she has more life in her than most anybody I've met. The people at the Department of Motor Vehicles know what I mean. When they renewed her driver's license recently they said to her, "Mary, you don't need to return here until you turn 103." I literally caught up with her on her way to ceremonies honoring her for the thousands of hours she's volunteered taking care of "those youngsters" at the Montclair Senior Center.

I sure wish I could write this good:

 I'm a real fan of this guy's writing. When he sent it time me, I couldn't stop reading it until I was wiping tears away at the end. OK, I'm envious and I wish I could write this well. I love the way he re-creates his childhood. It's as if I'm witnessing the whole thing. I hope you enjoy this.

can't quite remember when I turned against the idea of war, but I'm sure it had something to do with the fact that I didn't want to die. From pretty much the sixth grade on, I was firmly, solidly, against dying.

But up until then, I spent many years dying with verve in our neighborhood. The favorite game to play on our street was War. It beat Bloody Murder by a mile because it had weapons. Bloody Murder was really just a game of hide-and-seek (when you found the person hiding, you would yell "Bloody murder!" and everyone would try to make it back to touch the home pole before those who were hiding could tag you).