Beauty and the Beast (guess which is which), from May 12, 1990.
And they said it’d never last. Ho, ho.
Today Herself and I celebrate 34 years of Holy Macaroni. She makes regular visits to the eye doctor so it’s not my fault. She’s either extremely tolerant or a secret drinker. P’raps both.
And for those of you who are mothers or had mothers, happy Mother’s Day. Ours were in attendance at the wedding in Hyde State Park up to Fanta Se (third and fourth from left, below) and neither of them disowned us, though mine considered it after I told her she couldn’t smoke in our house.
My sister, Peggy (far right) married Howard, a fine fellow and a Brainiac to boot, but decided against motherhood based upon having grown up alongside Your Humble Narrator, who never did.
And we are likewise without offspring because … seriously, have you ever read this blog? I mean, c’mon. Herself may need vision correction, but she does not lack perception.
Mary Pigeon and Mary Jane O’Grady discuss the pitfalls of procreation.
Huh. And here I’d thought my mood had become disordered due to the pain in my ass, an ailment I contracted from reading The New York Times.
I shouldn’t pick on The Ould Gray Hoor here. Anxiety, depression, and ass pain can be acquired just about anywhere, from the lowliest blog (thanks for reading) to the self-anointed Newspaper of Record.
Lately we are presented with a sitting president going all Oprah on his studio audience — Look under your seats! Debt forgiveness for you! No arms for them! — and his predecessor snoozing through court dates, occasionally waking to flash the stink-eye around the room or curse a porn-star paramour. A third candidate for the job has a brain worm, a slow, underhand pitch not even I can take a swing at.
Two rappers are said to be “beefing,” which seems to mean “talking shit about each other from a safe distance.” You’d think these two gents might bump into each other at some social event, like the Met Gala — which is still getting coverage three days later — and then what? An X-slap followed by a virtual duel? Mics at 10 paces?
Speaking of talking shit, slaps, and mics, the House of Reprehensibles gave the back of the hand it wasn’t using to write the Liberty in Laundry Act, the Refrigerator Freedom Act, and the Hands Off Our Home Appliances Act (HOOHAA) to the Creature from the White Lagoon for trying to topple Squeaker Mikey Mouse (hey, if you can’t legislate, defenestrate). MTG couldn’t even get the window cracked, much less toss Mikey out of it. Nevertheless she drew reporters like a dead dog draws … well, reporters. (Hi, Kristi Noem!)
Shoot, we can’t even get a new iPad without drama. Not that I want one.
When not blowing my nose or shifting uncomfortably in my chair I wonder whether in the race to become all things to all people at all times the media have become “a dildo that has turned berserkly upon its owner,” to misuse a Thomas McGuane quote.
McGuane was talking about America. And in some small sense, I suppose, so am I. Back to you, Chet.
The Colorado Mountain College running team’s 2024 graduates: bottom, (l-r), Brooklyn German, Aslynn Wardall; top: Nate Encinias, Harrison Walter, Adaline Fulmer, Paulo Aponte. Not pictured: Kenneth Obregon.
By Hal Walter
For the first Sunday in a month of them, there is no long training run on tap for cross-country or track. There is no homework. There will be no evening commute to Leadville to deliver Harrison Walter to Colorado Mountain College.
The Blur, it seems, graduated from CMC this past Friday with an Associate of General Studies degree and proficiency certificates in welding.
It’s really a strange feeling and I am still processing it all. For the past two years life around here has revolved around Mary and me supporting Harrison through college. We’ve put about 30,000 miles on vehicles in doing so, and untold mileage on our brains. We knew it was a big risk sending him to Leadville to live in a dorm, but anything worth doing is worth the risk of failing. We also didn’t have a clue what we were getting ourselves into.
Between the ages of 62 and 64 I spent about 150 nights in a dorm room. We traveled to six states to watch Harrison and teammates run for the CMC Eagles. As his academic aide I learned how to operate Canvas and Basecamp. I read textbooks alongside him and helped guide him through countless assignments. During both summers I coached him through his running workouts.
All of this was out of the belief that a person on the autism spectrum deserved a shot at a college education and experience. He graduated teetering on the brink of the Dean’s List with a GPA of 3.46 (final grades are not yet in). It wasn’t all rainbows and unicorns, as he is surely on another Dean’s List for the number of write-ups received, all related to autistic behaviors.
Harrison at Huntsville (third from left). Photo: Hal Walter
As an athlete he left CMC with the school record for the track 10K, and runner-up best times for the 5K and 3K. In cross-country he holds CMC’s third-best cross-country 5K and fifth-fastest 8K, which he ran at the NJCAA National Championships in Huntsville, Ala. He also won the 5K Colorado Cup Snowshoe Race, hosted annually by CMC.
He received the running team’s Most Valuable Runner Award, as well as an award for his GPA and a letter.
And when he wasn’t studying or running he worked part time at Community Threads in Leadville.
There are too many people to thank in this space, but we owe a world of gratitude to his teammates and fellow students, coach and professors, faculty, staff and administration for the patience, support and compassion over these two years. There is a book in the works.
Perhaps rather than a month of Sundays it was an era of Sundays. The future, as Tom Petty sang, is wide open.
Harrison Walter, en route to graduating from Colorado Mountain College.
Congratulations and a tip of the Mad Dog mortarboard to Harrison Walter, who yesterday collected his Associate of General Studies degree from Colorado Mountain College in Leadville.
The big day kicked off with the traditional “Ski Down” of Dutch Henry Hill. Harrison — a letterman named Most Valuable Runner of the 2023-24 CMC Eagles’ men’s team — chose to leg it down on snowshoes.
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) delivered the commencement address, after which Harrison, his family and friends adjourned to the City on a Hill coffee shop for what his father, Hal, described as “a gala soiree.”
En route to his degree, Harrison also collected certificates of proficiency in basic welding and cutting and welding design and fabrication, and earned yet another certificate from the Eagles for maintaining a 3.0+ GPA as a student athlete. So it was a busy couple of years for the young fella.
Today the freshly minted graduate was reported to be resting comfortably at the family compound outside Weirdcliffe while his father examined the upshot of clearing out his dorm room.
“My truck, which looked like The Beverly Hillbillies’ … has been emptied into the living room,” he confided via Messages. “What a mess.”
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