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Halloween is here and it’s time for free candy. Is that a bad thing? Thirty years ago my wife and I committed ourselves to raise our children in a Christian home. We wanted to “do it right.”As very young parents we heard a lot about the observance of Halloween and its sordid connection to all things evil. We didn’t allow our kids to trick-or-treat because of our church’s teaching about the nefarious nature of the holiday.

We heard a very one-sided view of Halloween and all of its association with witches, the demonic, goblins, ghosts, and black magic. We heard sensationalized stories that scared the 4311 out of us.

“I think we ought to close Halloween down. Do you want your children to dress up as witches? The Druids used to dress up like this when they were doing human sacrifice…[The children] are acting out Satanic rituals and participating in it, and don’t even realize it.”–Pat Robertson, “The 700 Club,” 1982-OCT-29

Many years later I would do my own research concerning All Saints Eve, Reformation Day, cultural traditions, and a history of more moderate responses to the Halloween season. My philosophy holds that we should engage our culture bothintellectually and spiritually, (in fact, I would argue that these are one in the same). Intellectually we should think with a sound mind, not fearfully; we can be fully engaged, spiritually reasonable. For example, we know that the names for our months and days of the week are named after Roman deities and Norse gods, but that doesn’t prevent us from having a calendar.

I suppose there are some wiccans and druids who get pretty fired up about Halloween. Continue reading Fun Costumes, Cute Kids and Free Candy →

A man walks into a barber shop and sits in the chair. The barber asks, “How do you want your hair cut?” The man says, “I want it short on one side, uneven on the other side, crooked in the front and a hacked up in the back.” The barber shakes his head and says, “I don’t know if I can do that.” The man replied, “I don’t know why not, you had no problem last time.”

I like jokes. I happen to know one of the world’s foremost and talented joke tellers. His name is Robert “Uncle Bob” Caldwell. He lives is Granbury, Texas. I love that guy. I always wanted to be able to tell jokes like Uncle Bob. He could sure deliver a punch line.

One thing I’ve learned about punch lines, they don’t necessarily have to be in the context of a joke to be humorous. Sometimes a good punch line is simply the “pay-off” in a story.

NO BRAG. JUST FACT

It was a typical day in the barber shop— Dad was cutting hair, and his customer was resting comfortably with his eyes closed.

The front door opened, and Dad glanced up to say, “Morning. Come in, you’re next.”

What happened next amused my dad to no end, and his retelling of the story over the next few days was his delight … Continue reading I Am The Best: No Brag, Just Fact →

Showcasing Red Dirt culture ~ authored and managed by contributors with connections to the great state of Oklahoma.