Visiting the words of pundits, poets on a lovely fall afternoon

I sat on the back porch this afternoon during one of the most wonderful fall days we’ve had this year. That is saying a lot, because we’ve had only three wonderful fall days. The rest have been too cold, too windy, too warm, too rainy, or just too easy to ignore. We get so used to staying inside, that we forget to see if it is nice outside. If we leave the house early in the day, it is with trepidation. Do we need a sweater, an umbrella, or puffer jacket with a fur-bound hood. It usually warms by lunch, but we don’t notice.

I’ve been a bit lazy lately. I’m ashamed of sitting in front of the television, guilt-ridden over the number of cooking shows I’ve watched… only to find myself eating a peanut butter sandwich. Shame has me looking for some industrious pastime. Last week, I put together a jigsaw puzzle. It’s much more fun if you have someone working with you, but I did finish it. One day I pulled out the stove in the kitchen and retrieved the rubber tool for opening lids. It fell back there a year or so ago. It took me several days to purge the bookshelves of the unwanted books.

Today, I happened by one of those shelves and noticed Pundits, Poets and Wits. My BFF (best friend forever) had inscribed it to me back in 1992 when she gave it to me for Christmas. I had been writing the column about a year at that time, and she wished me luck in becoming famous like the writers included in this book. Well, it’s been thirty years and I’m still plugging… although the Washington Post and New York papers have not come calling.

I don’t remember reading much of the book. I think I told someone at the time I didn’t want to be influenced by other writers. Lord, that was a stupid statement. To think that I could pass off Mark Twain’s or Art Buchwald’s or even Erma Bombeck’s humor as mine. I really missed out by scooting this book to the back of the shelf. Oh, I’ve read works by these people from other sources, but I’d never read Walter Winchell’s views on New York, Dorothy Thompson’s warnings about Hitler and his invasion of Eastern Europe, or E.B. White’s insight into the foreign language of Maine which reminded me of our local twist on the Mother Tongue.

Some of these writers gave great insight into the world as they knew it. Like the opinionated writers of modern times, we must realize that their conservatism or liberalism was often met with objection. None of them was writing to just “give the latest breaking news.” Because their writing appeared on the “Opinion” page, they were able to open the eyes of the reader, challenge the buried prejudices, entertain the populace while questioning the “truths” of our society.

The country doesn’t have as many newspapers and magazines as it once did. Columnists are few and far between. Opinions are polarized into separate cable television networks. Liberal or Conservative, we steer clear of those who disagree with us. It is our loss.

My writing, my opinions, and my stories of silliness haven’t moved to the Pundit Level. Thirty-two years of weekly sending six hundred words to the people of this area have given me great joy. Although Molly Ivins, Lewis Grizzard, and other great humor writers have passed on, they have left many a word to help wile away the fall afternoons. Maybe some of my words will linger, too.