Overton High School honors student athletes

Overton High School athletes were honored Monday in the annual athletic banquet at the activities center of First Assembly of God Church in Overton.

Multisport standouts Abby Mackey, Jesse Roach, K.J. Luster and Savannah Bobbitt were named Outstanding Senior Athletes. Luster and Greg Moore were honored with the Coach Chester Roy Memorial Scholarship Award, while Bobbitt and Mackey were presented with the Debbie Sartors Gounah Memorial Scholarship Award.

Roach and Jacee Stuart were presented with the Felicia Rinehart Roach Scholarship Award, with Roach also receiving the Robert Young Memorial Award Scholarship from Young’s daughter Robbi Young Carnes.

Dr. Charles Long presented Stuart and Colby Carpenter with the Charles Long Memorial Scholarship in honor of his son.

Nothing like a Texas storm

After several long bursts of wind and a low distant roll of thunder, the wind is still, then it rises up again. Warm and fragrant, almost dream-like, everything seems unreal. From his boyhood Aaron never understood how the climate  in his small patch of Texas could be so consistently inconsistent. The people both mercurial and solemn, pious and wild.

“This state is like a woman,” he said, as Moses sat on the dock watching the lake waver and undulate against the darkening sky. “And sometimes it’s like an abusive drunk. The kind of drunk who seduces his woman with such tenderness, such sweetness, that his explosive and violent outbursts are all the more terrifying.”

— from Aaron & Moses by Matthew Prosser

Walking the walk “outside the lines”

NBA player Jason Collins made headlines last week with his announcement that he is gay. Collins is the first player in the four major American sports leagues to do so.

During an ensuing discussion of Collins on ESPN’s Outside the Lines, analyst Chris Broussard stated that as a Christian, he believes that practicing a homosexual lifestyle is a sin. L.Z. Henderson, a fellow ESPN contributor who self-identifies as Christian and gay, responded on the program, resulting in a discussion that may serve as a model for Christians who continue to wrestle with this topic.

Their example is especially noteworthy given the fallout of their conversation. As one would expect, there has been a firestorm of social media both decrying and defending Broussard. But, admittedly, I’m concerned with the tendency of some who label the criticism of Broussard as “persecution.”

“Are you sure you want to be a journalist?”

This is a transcript of the opening remarks I made during a guest lecture for an assembly of soon-to-be-graduating journalism students at the University of Texas at Tyler:

Hello there… before I begin, I just want to say one thing: don’t do it for the money.

Up, A Creek

So I find myself at home, the very place I find myself to be at home more than any other.

I am sheltered under tall trees, enveloped by the gentle sloping hills and trails, cooled by gently trickling creeks ‘neath shady groves, warmed in the sunlit meadows — my outstretched hands grazing the tops of the tall grasses as I walk barefoot through The Land, My Land.

Though I have walked many miles upon His resplendent terrestrial sphere, it is to this small spot of hidden woodlands that I have long pledged my fealty.

Not to a flag, or nation, but this obscure plot of rural lakeland. What I now stand upon, is what I stand for. This land, this sweet land, this good earth.

I walk long, my stomach filled by the work of many hands — my kinsmen and beloved ones — who now rest in repose. But I, of restless mind, must retire myself to me, to think and ponder and wonder and wander.

Grooving…

	
Long day     s t r e t c h e s 
	into a low slow night.

The children are bathed and kissed,
	sent dreaming
		into their beds,
	and the household darkens
and cools
	into a sweet slumber.

She and me, we,
			repose and lean back.
For this sweet
		too-brief stanza,
yes, it's just we.
			A bottle of wine,
		a record player
			and amber light.

I drop the needle and
				after a scratch and crackle,
			the soft tones rise up
		soft and gentle lilting singing
	of our summer-colored youth.

We loaf and lean against each other,
			talking of everything,
			dancing wearily
		in each others arms
	in words and laughter.

The music is a sweet incense,
			and we rest within each other.

As the earth turns its hurry through the universe,
					all is she and I, we, and we're grooving.

With the Media, there’s always more to the story…

If you’ve been following the news the past week or so, you may believe that an Elvis impersonator from Mississippi is being held for mailing ricin-laced letters to President Obama, that more than 60 people died in a fertilizer plant explosion in Texas, and that two Eastern Orthodox bishops were kidnapped by terrorists and released the same day.

But while each of those items contains a grain of truth, they are mostly false. The bishops were abducted, but major news agencies were fooled into believing they had been released; the death toll in the West explosion is 14; and Paul Kevin Curtis was released by investigators who believe he might have been framed.

The problem isn’t merely that much of the news is inaccurate — that is an inevitable feature of the ravenous daily news cycle — but that most news is largely irrelevant to our lives as Christians. Most of us realize that the events of last week will probably not have a significant direct effect on how we live. Indeed, if we’re being honest with ourselves, most of us would have to admit that what is sold as news is rarely newsworthy at all.

8 new things we’ve learned about music

In one those strange twists of modern life, we were reminded last week of the power of music…  at a hockey game.

HDN staffers clean house at state convention

DURANT, Okla. — Overton native Matthew Prosser was one of several Henderson Daily News staffers honored North and East Texas Press Association’s 2013 Better Newspaper Contest.

“We’re always honored when our peers recognize our efforts to publish a good community newspaper,” said HDN publisher Les Linebarger. “More importantly, we want our readers and advertisers to be assured that we are making every effort to produce the best newspaper we can for the good people of Rusk County.”

Prosser, who serves as managing editor of both the Henderson Daily News and Overton News, was awarded first-place in Feature Writing for the third consecutive year — with a hotly-contested second place in both Column and News Writing as well as for News and Feature photography categories.

Thus, we are reaping our whirlwind…

Am I the only one who feels like there’s some kind of cosmic joke being played out in our culture right now?

More often than not, bad art is celebrated and good art reviled. In our communication and dialogue, grammar and spelling were no longer important. To be clean is no better than to be filthy. Criminals deserve as much sympathy as their victims. Good manners are no better than bad. In fact, bad behavior (especially among celebrities!) is lionized.

I have long suspected that the greatest way to destroy a civilization is not to outright defile what is sacred, but to make sacred the profane — and thus debase everything that is hallowed. And few things are more debased in our era than our most fundamental institution: the family.

Garden Club hosts ‘high tea’ for 4th graders

Twenty members of Overton’s Queen Price Garden Club kept a 50-plus year tradition alive by hosting “high tea” for the fourth-grade girls from Overton Elementary School.

The young women were escorted from their school bus to an elegant setting inside the garden club home featuring homemade hats, cloth napkins and the finest silver and glassware.Each girl was served cold sweet tea from a silver tea service, accompanied by finger sandwiches, cupcakes, fruit and a scrumptious parfait during the hour-long event.

The young women were decked out in their Sunday best for the tea, and they were allowed to keep the hats made for them by garden club members.

After enjoying tea and refreshments, members of the garden club detailed the flowers for every month of the year. The young lady with a birthday in that month was asked to stand and was given a spray of flowers by the garden club as they learned about the flower for their birthday month.

Income tax deadline is midnight tonight

If you haven’t filed your 2012 tax return, today is the deadline to do so. Returns must be postmarked by midnight tonight to be considered on time.

Taxpayers who don’t think they can meet today’s deadline of having their taxes filed and postmarked may find relief by opting for a six month extension.

Our shameful dereliction of duty…

In the last few months an issue has come to my attention that, as a journalist, has cut me to the very core of my being.

A “doctor” from an abortion clinic in Philadelphia stands trial for third-degree murder in the death of one female patient and multiple first-degree murder charges in the death of seven live-born infants.

In just typing that above sentence, a chill runs up my spine and my eyes start to mist over. It is an atrocity of the highest order. A physician, sworn by the sacred Hippocratic oath of “do no harm” would dare to sever the tenuous life of those most innocent and vulnerable.

Social media sexting, cyberbullying on the rise

For one Rusk County mother it was like something out of a nightmare.

“I went to the computer to check my Facebook and my daughter had left her account logged in and on her private messages,” she said. “Before I could log her out, I noticed a conversation that had taken place the night before […] I couldn’t believe what I saw.”

The mother, who asked that her name not be published in the interest of her children’s privacy, said she saw an exchange of “an extremely sexual nature” between her daughter and a boy, purportedly in her class.

“I was stunned, frightened, and angry,” she said. “I called the school to get the contact information of the boy’s parents.”

However the school was unable to identify the other student involved. The mother discovered that, not only was the “boy” not a student at her daughter’s school, but that he didn’t exist.

Troy Parrish memorialized in annual golf tourney

Troy Parrish was a friend to many, whose life was cut short by a tragic auto accident on Jan. 8, 2010. But, his memory lives on with a scholarship fund that relatives and friends have put together to honor his life.

The lifeblood of that scholarship fund is a golf tournament hosted by Justin Lake, Andy Marshall, Blake Thompson, Kelly Stanley and a number of other friends

The 3rd Annual “54” Troy Parrish Memorial Golf Tourney, is scheduled for May 4 at the Overton Golf and Country Club.

“Troy was a special guy, loved by all, who had his life cut way too short by the automobile accident,” Marshall said. “Some of his friends wanted to honor his life, so we came up with the golf tournament and scholarship idea. So far, the tournament has grown each year, and the scholarship fund continues to increase each year as well.”

STAAR tests begin this week amid uncertainty

State-mandated tests loom for public school students across Texas this week, but fifth- and eighth-graders do not yet know if they must pass the exams to move up a grade.

The State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness begin Tuesday for fifth- and eighth-graders, and “parents and students should assume that the promotion requirements will be in place,” said Texas Education Agency spokeswoman Debbie Ratcliffe, who added that a decision might come early this week.

Heart’s Last Lonely Beat

Easy goes the lonely ones
who yearn only to be seen,
to cornered rooms through passage ways
shines light through front door screens,
and darker moons make darker rooms
’till streetlights disturb our sleep.

From candlelight to wildfires
we dance like coals beneath our feet,
and household sounds creep overhead
we hear music down the street.

Danger knows the rowdy ones
who only chase their dreams,
spinning wheels past city signs

Together living’s cheap,
from wallflowers to wildflowers
to my heart’s last lonely beat.

He is risen indeed… so now what?

So it is Easter. Hallelujah and amen. He is risen, He is risen indeed. Great, grand, wonderful! So…  now what?

We have been reminded of and celebrated the fact that Jesus conquered sin and death and rose from the grave. Churches around the world did their best to worship God and inspire people. Choirs burst forth in song, preachers gave their all, the faithful dressed in their best. And with that, Easter for this year is over.

So…  now what? What will you do differently in light of all the assurance, hope, and inspiration you received on this glorious Easter morning?

To my son on his birthday…

Today you turned ten years of age, my eldest son, today is your birthday.

I still remember that pre-Dawn drive to the hospital on that rainy Oklahoma morning. After waiting all morning you finally arrived in the afternoon, to a clear and breezy beautiful afternoon.

You are at a curious crossroads in your development, Israel, with so many varied and strange emergent facets of your personality developing.

Palm Sunday’s rebuke of ‘Big Religion’

Palm Sunday kicks off the biggest week of the Christian calendar. Yet I find it ironic that, central to Palm Sunday, is Jesus’ most dramatic attack against “Big Religion.”

‘Book Talk’ promotes love of literature

It’s a chance to cultivate, as well as encourage, a love for all things literary among local citizens.

London School explosion survivors observe 76 years

Monday marks the 76th anniversary of the New London School explosion, when more than 300 lives were lost in the world’s worst school tragedy at that time.

Local jobless rates higher than state average

Rusk County unemployment checked in at 6.6 percent in January, staying just over state and national averages for the same period, according to the March report released from the Texas Workforce Commission.

The county’s unemployment rate rose from 5.5 percent in December 2012.

The new local figures are based on total countywide employment being at 25,173 in January, a decrease of 102 jobs from 25,275 for December 2012.

Area sales tax revenue remains steady

Consumer confidence has cooled in Henderson, with March 2013 collections up only .64 percent compared to this time last year, according to the new statewide sales tax summary from the Texas Comptroller’s Office.

George P. Bush running for office in Texas

Ending months of speculation, Fort Worth attorney George P. Bush announced he would run for the office of Texas Land Commissioner with a Twitter message, after confirming that current Commissioner Jerry Patterson would not seek re-election