The Pulse has completed 15 years of operating and publishing.
That is the type of thing that, 15 years ago, I hoped to be able to be able to say someday.
Thanks, as always, for everyone’s support of this endeavor. Compiling, financing, writing, designing, publishing and distributing this thing has its challenges and frustrations; it’s not always easy, but I remain enormously blessed. Murfreesboro has been good to the Pulse and has offered the support, encouragement, readership and advertising to keep this little independent media outlet going.
Say what you want to say today. You don’t know when someone will be going away.
Set aside the time to do the things you want and need to do this year and the time to spend with those you want to be around.
Bracken Jr. asked me a couple of years ago “how many hours are in a year?”
After some calculations, we discovered that a year contains 8,760 hours.
Hmm, that’s not that many. Especially considering that one may sleep approximately 2,920 of those hours if they would like to get their eight hours. Working 40 hours per week (taking two weeks of vacation of course), well, there goes another 2,000.
How much time do you need to eat, prepare your meals, grocery shop, wash dishes, bathe, get your haircut, mow the yard and all of that?
Wait, you still haven’t exercised yet!
Use your hours wisely. You may not have as many as you think.
The NFL pulled it off. The league played all 256 games of the 2020 regular season.
It wasn’t exactly “normal.” They had to reschedule a few games, and played many of the games in empty or almost empty stadiums. Some of the players could not participate in certain games after positive virus test results, and the league cancelled the preseason and the Pro-Bowl (not a big deal), but they delivered their product, played the game they love, kept some people employed and accomplished the mission of completing an entire regular season in a year when so many organizations simply abandoned plans.
Don’t be bullied into covering your face if you are not comfortable doing so.
When it comes to masks, I support your right to choose what to do with your own body.
When I heard of the Tennessee governor’s wife testing positive for Coronavirus, I first thought, “Well, anyone could catch the virus. I hope she recovers quickly.” But thinking about it, it’s really not a good look for the governor. He represents himself as the man with the plan. He says he knows that masks are the weapons to fight the virus.
So either he didn’t have the leadership to convince his wife to strap a napkin to her own face, which does not reflect well on the executive, or she did wear the face covering and still got the virus, blowing a hole in the governor’s logic, also not a good look.
Decide for yourself. If you feel that covering your face will be the best decision for your health, by all means, do so.
If you determine that breathing and speaking freely without a mask on is the best decision . . . well, at this point, I am not part of the establishment attempting to convince healthy people that walking around with a piece of cloth on their face while conducting everyday activities for the rest of time is a normal thing to do.
Especially not for kids. How much sense does it make to force children to keep their faces covered all day? How many instances have you heard of regarding kids experiencing significant negative effects from the virus? Now, how many instances have there been of kids experiencing negative effects from wearing masks?
Kids have sacrificed just about enough over the past year. Many were forced to give up sports, summer camp, vacations, youth group activities, holiday gatherings, recitals, plays and various other activities.
Stay home forever if you want. Wear a mask everywhere if you choose. But it’s getting pretty close to time to allow the young and healthy to live.
