Oct 20 Birds and Bees

 

Hayter for Oct 20, 2024

“It sure took a lot to get you here!”

Warning: If your child can read, and doesn’t have a hint about the birds and the bees, you may not want him to read this. Of course, I haven’t written this article yet, so you might want to wait for the ending of this thing before making your own decision.

I don’t remember when my Dad told me about the birds and the bees. I imagine I was about 10. I don’t even remember what he told me because, at the time, he was mad about having to spill the proverbial beans. – “Really, you don’t know? Oh, shoot! Well, pay attention because I’m only going to say this once.”

When Dad was angry, he was a fast talker. No time for any description of the what, where, when, or how steps of the process. Mom must’ve told him to do it. I imagine we were at the drive-in and an actor used a bad word, and I asked Mom what it meant. If she said, “Ask your daddy.” I would’ve answered, “Never mind.”

Dad ended up telling me the whole story faster than a speeding bullet. I understood it just enough to be embarrassed about it. Maybe not as much as Dad. At that moment I was determined to never get married. – To be honest, though, I think I could’ve handled it better had Dad not made up so many different names for things.

Okay, all of that sexual stuff was a segue into today’s topic, which is “What were the chances of you being born?” – If you never took biology, you may not understand the title.

I don’t care to get too specific about the topic, but you’re likely familiar with the male’s responsibility for babymaking. The guy, depending on his age, delivers from 100 million to 300 million sperm in one trip. With a 300 million sperm count, one-third will head where they’re supposed to. Another 100 million will go all over the place, except where they’re supposed to. And the final 100 million don’t go anywhere. They just hang around and make small talk. -- “Does anybody know why we’re here?” They’re completely out of it. At times I feel as if I may be the result of one of those final 100 million do-nothing-cells.

That aside, in the birthing process, the female contributes one egg that should accept one of the 100 million sperm knocking on or near the door. After allowing one of the sperm in the doorway. The fertilized egg will soon take on a biological name referencing what happens when 23 female chromosomes come together with 23 male chromosomes. It’s called a zygote. I tell you where it got its name, but it would’ve taken me another 30 minutes. The point is, you and I were once zygotes. Hey, it was a surprise to me, too.

After that, the cells start splitting until the entire conglomerate becomes a fetus… which will eventually become a human being. If any one particular cell bailed out and another took its place, the baby might turn out to be a different gender, with different talents, possibly including a never-dying desire to dance or bowl. 

 Elsie and Faris Hayter ended up with seven kiddos. Each of the boys looks a little bit alike. I remember the four of us were sitting on a brick wall that was holding back a deep stream when a young boy walked up and asked, “Are y’all twins?” Before that, I’d never seen the similarities

Each offspring will have a different personality and talent from the others… unless their father was a professional football player. The different physical health, eyesight, and foot size may be different. It all depends on which particular sperm from the 100 million won the race to the egg. The eyesight, foot size, brain capacity, taste in food, desire to read, be a biologist…  

The female egg contains 23 female chromosomes and the male carries 23 male chromosomes. When they meet up, they become 46 chromosomes which is called a zygote. And that my diligent reader, is how each of us got here. We were each once a zygote. And, like you, I don’t remember a thing about it.

The chance of you being a zygote was a few 100 million to one. But you made it. If any one step had been altered, like say, the 87,431,173rd sperm knocked you to the side and became the first sperm to reach the egg. Your sperm would have a short lifespan in a crowded area. The good news is, you would soon die as a sperm not chosen. And, you wouldn’t care, because you would never remember the way you were.

But, as it turned out for you, I believe the hand of God was involved in seeing that one particular egg picked one particular sperm to be a child with particular interests, talents, personalities, likes, dislikes, and looks. It goes all the way back to our time as a zygote. If we never made it to the zygote stage, our parents wouldn’t even know enough to care. – Why? Right, you never existed

If you happen to be reading this thing right now, you need to thank your mom for the use of 23 of her chromosomes and your dad for his 23. As a result, here you are. How do you feel about that? – Sorry for the zygotes that never formed? Get over it.           

PS: About whether or not you should let your child in on this story? Let me say this. If my dad had read this article to me, I still wouldn’t have known what he was talking about.

      

hayter.mark@gmail.com                    end

Oct 13 Happy vs Sad

 

Hayter for Oct 13 2024

Happy vs. Sad

            I’m thinking un-seriously of writing a book on attitude improvement. I’m still working on the title. I’m having trouble choosing between “How to Be Happy” or “How Not to Be Sad”.

            I can’t help but notice that there are a lot of people who can’t be happy unless they’re upset about something. I have been an example of that a time or two, but I’m getting over it. You see, I’ve done some research on being happy. By the time I’m through here, you’ll have a much better attitude on life. Maybe.

            First of all, we must come to grips with the notion that we will always experience some bad stuff and some good stuff. Generally speaking, both of them don’t happen at the same time. Take Buddha, for example. He was born in Nepal and given the name Siddhartha Gautama. His dad was a rich and powerful ruler who spoiled his son rotten. He had everything he wanted, except the opportunity to see the people living outside of the Castle.

            In time he left his father’s beautiful palace and wandered all around India. In doing so, he got taste a of sadness. He was so moved that he developed a religion known today as Buddhism. The four largest religions as of today are Christianity with two billion followers. Islam which is a little shy of two billion, Hinduism with about one billion, and Buddhism with 500 million.

There are a bunch of other religions to choose from, but the followers of practically all religions believe that after death, your spirit is judged and if you’re good you go to a nice place forever, and if you’re bad you go to a much worse place forever. Some believe that it’s possible to get a reprieve from the worst place. That would be, like, better, because eternity goes on for a long time.

It’s now time for the question, “How difficult is it to be happy?” The Houston Texans winning a game makes me happy. If they had lost every game so far, I’d quit worrying about them.

Perhaps a better example of happiness and sadness comes from the fact that I enjoyed my job as a teacher, particularly when I was in front of the class. I didn’t enjoy much of the other duties that came along with teaching.

When I was a teacher, I had several retired friends who told me that they were working harder than they did when they had jobs. I was too polite to tell them that they apparently misunderstood the word “retire.”

My type of occupation today is the greatest role in my life. I didn’t even have it this good when I was a kid. My biggest sadness today is when I’m sick or have to take a bath. Kay and I are blessed as we can be, yet I still dread so many things that don’t amount to a hill of beans. For me, happiness depends more on “where I am” than “who I am.” And, that’s just wrong!

Among my joys in life thus far, have been the opportunities I’ve had to act on stage. I don’t enjoy rehearsals much, but I enjoy the play itself. It was pretty much the same with football. I hated practice, because they ran your rear off and yelled at you for messing up. However, playing in the actual football game was as great as being on stage as the curtain opens.

That being said, I always had a sense of relief after each stage play, just as I was usually pleased when football season was over. That’s called dodging happiness. For years I wanted to be a famous movie actor. I’m past that now.  I recently saw Harrison Ford on Jimmy Kimmel. He looked kind of sick  and had trouble talking. I’d feel sorry for him, but the guy is worth $300 million.

Clint Eastwood is 94, and  he’s worth $375 million. I would assume that he and Harrison Ford would turn loose of their wealth for a chance to be the talent they once were. Point being, a major sadness is the realization that you can never be the way you were.

I can’t get over the number of famous actors who have recently passed away. Kris Kristofferson’s passing hit me hard. He was among the best songwriters ever. He had less than an inviting voice, and I loved it.

So far, I must assume that neither of us has experienced the same amount of happiness.  Yet, we each have hope for the time remaining. It’s been said that “Without sadness, happiness has no meaning.” I hate that. But I believe it.  

            What I learned from today’s article was… no more than I knew when I started. Therefore, what say, I end with a saying from Persian astronomer, mathematician, philosopher and poet Omar Khayyam? My sister, Jill, gifted me the a few lines from a poem he wrote. She knitted it to a plastic backing. It reads:

“The moving finger writes and having writ,

Moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a line,

Nor all thy tears washout a word of it.”

            These are but a few short lines of a very long poem. The message obviously makes note of the fact that you can’t erase words already said nor actions previously done.

            The message being that perhaps I should think through situations before acting on them. Better now than never. -- I think I need to have Jill sew that onto a bed-sheet for me.

hayter.mark@gmail.com                    End

Oct 6 history of names

 

Hayter for Oct 6, 2024

“Name Calling”

            I’ve made no secret of the fact that I’m a man with odd thoughts… and behavior. That sentence alone is cause enough for you to stop reading. But for you tired, you poor, you huddled masses yearning to breathe free, I shall continue. -- I borrowed that from the Statue of Liberty Lady. She is quite the poet.

Now that the sane among us have moved along to the want ads, I shall begin to discuss some weird, but educational facts. Last night I read an article about “Name Calling”. It’s not what you think. This is about the discovery of the first person’s name that was ever located. Some of you are thinking that it was Fred Flintstone. A couple of you feel sure that “Adam” was the first name to be discovered. Well, it may have been, but it was not the first name that’s been located etched in stone.

That name belongs to “Ku-Sim.” I know you’ve never heard of him! Or her. The name was discovered years ago sketched on a slab of stone found in, what used to be, Mesopotamia. Today Mesopotamia belongs to Iraq. For decades Sadam Hussein took credit for the Garden of Eden and the whole Adam and Eve thing. – Let’s try to get past that silliness and find out about the stone.

The stone was at one time a moist clay tablet with weird etchings on the exterior. It took a good while before the weird symbols to be interpreted as words. A really smart person determined the writing were done by an accountant who kept a record of grain and veggies that had been shipped in or out of the Tigris or Euphrates Rivers. The last words on the tablet were “Ku-Sim”?

That was the only time those two words were discovered on any itching. So, the interpreter took that to mean it must’ve been the name of the accountant responsible for tabulating all of the goods that came in or out on that day

Later they put the words together and made them read “Kushim”. The words on the stone were written over 5000 years ago. While there have been many etchings and lettering written before 3000 BC, Ku-Sim was the first time a person’s name was discovered on any kind of writing. The first word discovered was “oats”. Just a guess.

Once discovered, the name “Kushin” caught on. Today it is 2,168,711^th most popular name in the world. I kid you not. Can any of you tell me how that was figured out? – Well, you’re not the only one.

By the way, the second oldest name ever recorded was located in Egypt. It was Kushim or Iry-Hor. Obviously, it was a name used to taunt people. That’s a poor attempt at humor. But the Iry-Hor is no joke. 

For something a bit more contemporary, I shall share with you some of the most popular male and female for the past 100 years. Since 1920 “James” has been the most popular name for a guy. The most popular female name is “Mary”. Not as interesting as Kushim or Iry-Hor, but much more pleasant sounding.

The 15^th most popular female name since 1920 is “Ashley”. I like the name. The 15^th most popular male name has been “Mark.” I would’ve much rather “Mark” have been way down on the list right before the 100^th most popular male name which was Lou. – Actually, Lou did not make the top 100 list. Bradley was the 100^th choice for a guy.      

Mom named each of the Hayter kids. I’m not saying that Dad didn’t care to, but he really didn’t. His mom named him “Faris”. I think there are only two more men with that name. They both lived in Mesopotamia. The children of Faris and Elsie were named Lynda, Larry, Susan, Dennis, Mark, Jill, and Al. I asked Mom if Larry, Dennis, Al, and I were named after her old boyfriends. She said that Faris was her first and only boyfriend. Good answer, Mom.   

Now it’s time for some sports tidbits: “In 1963, major league baseball pitcher Gaylord Perry remarked, ‘They'll put a man on the moon before I hit a home run.’ On July 20, 1969, an hour after Neil Armstrong set foot on the surface of the moon, Perry hit his first, and only, home run while playing for the San Francisco Giants.” Most baseball fans know that Major League pitchers can’t hit worth beans… unless they’re from Japan. Japanese pitchers have been known to really knock the snot out of the ball.

            “The five circles on each Olympic flag are always red, black, blue, green, and yellow on a field of white. This is because at least one of those colors appears on the flag of every nation on the planet.” I have trouble believing that, but I refuse to research it.

“The average lifespan of a major league baseball is 7 pitches.” I assume that the umpire gives the catcher a new ball at the start of each inning. And they’ll occasionally check the condition of a ball during the middle of the inning

“A Costa Rican worker who makes baseballs earns about $2,750 annually. The average American pro baseball player earns $2,377,000 per year.” I can come up with no cute words about that.

“A ‘jiffy’ is 1/100th of a second.” I have really been misusing that word. Even though I’ve promised many times to be back in a “jiffy” it’s never happened. The only thing I’ve ever been able to do in a jiffy is sneeze.

All right, our time is about up, so I’m going to leave you with this last weird fact, in hopes of saving at least one of us. -- Someone did the research to discover that “an average of 100 people choke to death on ballpoint pens every year.” What say, we keep anything with the word “pin” in it, out of our mouths? I’ll be proud if only save one of you.

hayter.mark@gmail.com                                        End