Impromptus

Tricks of time, &c.

By
Baseball legend Reggie Jackson looks on prior to a game at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas, October 18, 2023. (Daniel Shirey / MLB Photos via Getty Images)
On Reggie Jackson and civil rights; the Ten Commandments as political football; cigarette slogans we have known; and more

Time is such a strange phenomenon. I know I’m not the first to say this. I’m the trillion and first. Still. This may seem weird to you, but: I entered college in 1982. The Vietnam War seemed far back in the past to me. Saigon fell, as you know, in 1975. The civil rights movement seemed far back in the past — the Montgomery bus boycott, the assassination of MLK, etc. And yet . . .

Last week, I was listening to Reggie Jackson, the great ballplayer. He joined the major leagues in 1967. He was talking about the racism he had to endure: “The n***** can’t eat here,” “The n***** can’t stay here,” and all that.

When I was young, that period seemed far away — far back in the past. (It wasn’t even over.) To me today, it seems so near.

Maybe I could add a footnote to my little musings here. In 1984 or so, I said to my grandmother — a Washingtonian — “When did they start letting Jews into country clubs like Burning Tree, Columbia, and Congressional?” She said, slyly, “Have they?”


More in Baseball

• Willie Mays has died at 93. You would expect George F. Will to be masterly — one master writing about another — and he is: in this appreciation. One of Will’s main points: You may be a “natural,” but you still have to work your tail off.

So true. The combination of great talent and hard work — iron discipline — is unbeatable. See Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, and others (not just athletes, but musicians, scientists, and all the rest).

A footnote: Willie Mays was known as the “Say Hey Kid.” To this day, a friend will answer his phone — after seeing my name on his Caller ID — “Say hey!”

• I wonder if you saw Bill Greason, who joined the Birmingham Black Barons in ’48:

• It is now law in Louisiana that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public-school classroom. I would rather politicians, and others, obeyed the Ten Commandments than that they turned them into a political football — a football in our endless game of “red” versus “blue.” I seriously doubt that boosters of the law, many of them, give a rip about the Ten Commandments.

One of those boosters is Donald Trump (as you can read here). Please.

• Here is something to consider: For generations, religious parents have sought private schools for their children. In Louisiana, will secular parents now do the same?

• In recent days, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee has said, “The notion that tariffs are a tax on U.S. consumers is a lie pushed by outsourcers and the Chinese Communist Party.” In reality, it is a truth pushed by economics.

Kevin D. Williamson wrote about this, here. So did Andrew Stuttaford, here. I recommend these articles.

And here is Donald Trump — who will be the Republicans’ nominee for president three times in a row:

“A nice genius.” Uh-huh.

Since the 1980s, I have said, “Economic illiteracy is the Democrats’ best friend” (meaning, it helps them at the polls, as demagoguery and populism often do). The same is true for the Republicans, I suppose.

• Maybe you saw this one?

I tried to imagine Bob Dole talking that way. Or John McCain. (Each of those men came back from war in pretty bad shape, as you remember.) Impossible.

• “Bob Schul, a Singular U.S. Olympian in the 5,000-Meter Race, Dies at 86.” That is the heading over this obit in the New York Times. We go on to read, “He developed asthma as a child, and he wore his grandfather’s World War I gas mask for protection from fumes and dust when driving a tractor on the family farm.” From that to — an Olympic gold medal, in track. Magnificent.

• Let’s have a little language. One of the most interesting and enjoyable words in our language is “Oi.” Did I say “our”? Well, you hear this word in Britain. Grammarians classify it as an “interjection.” The TV series Ted Lasso, which is about a London soccer team, is replete with it.

I recall something from Boris Johnson’s time as mayor. He said to a young man sitting across from him, “Oi, there’s no eating on the Tube.”

Classic.

• I was having lunch with a friend in Michigan last week. Something reminded him of a cigarette slogan — an old one. (What other kind is there these days?) “They satisfy.” Meaning Chesterfield cigarettes. My friend thought of another cigarette slogan — possibly older, and also for Chesterfield: “Blow some smoke my way.”

This led us to remember two more: “I’d walk a mile for a Camel.” And, “Winston tastes good like a cigarette should.”

Grammarians objected to that last one — because the sloganeers said “like” instead of the correct “as.”

(After Good Morning America premiered in 1975, a lot of people figured you could do without the comma in such phrases. Too bad. In 1989, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids came out. Good comma. But “shrunk,” not “shrank”? These are milestones on the long, winding road of language.)

• See this smushed-up lil’ sandwich?

I picked it up at an airport store. (Picked it up literally.) I said to a woman near me — a stranger — “Guess how much this costs.” She said, “Eleven dollars.” Nope — $15.59! (No sale.)

• Here is my beautiful little hometown, Ann Arbor, Mich., which has drawn people from all over the world, for many generations.

• A cornerstone, downtown:

• Old Glory, smack in the middle of campus — smack in the middle of the University of Michigan (right side up, too):

• I like a stone house — a lot:

• A2 is crawling with these orange lilies:

This little garden is pretty nice too.

Have a good week, my friends.

If you would like to receive Impromptus by e-mail — links to new columns — write to jnordlinger@nationalreview.com.

Exit mobile version