The Fall Classic: It's About That Time

It's time to Break It Down!

 

It is often said time flies. It doesn’t. At least not in the literal sense. 24/7/365 has been a standard for quite some time, even though this year has 366 days. But the number of seconds in a minute, minutes in an hour, hours in a day, days in a week, weeks in a month, months in a year, years in a decade, decades in a century, and centuries in a millennium have been set for some time now. And they all proceed according to long observed, and widely accepted terms. They are as predictable as the atomic clock is reliable.

 

But over time, customs do change. Sometimes, it can seem like only yesterday, when in reality, it was eons ago. When I was growing up, baseball was America’s game. It was the first game I was exposed to; introduced by my father who was a most ardent fan of the game. He even played a little semi-pro ball, at least that what I’ve been told by relatives who knew him in his salad days. 

 

My father was not just a baseball fan, like many Black men in his era who followed the sport, he was a Dodgers fan. At an early age, I inherited my love of the game from him, and also my Dodger fandom. Watching the Saturday afternoon game of the week together was our thing. 

 

As the arc of life would have it, I spent a couple of summers in New York, after third and fourth grades. Although that was way before Cable TV, in New York, the home of the Yankees and the recently formed Mets, there was a game on most evenings during the summer. I don’t remember all the players, but Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale, pitchers for the Dodgers were two of my early personal faves. Bob Gibson, and Juan Marichal were also standouts. Yes, I had an affinity for the guys who had the ball in their hands, and who on good days, baffled hitters, and occasionally threw no-hitters, and on the rarest of occasions, a perfect game.

 

Baseball’s playoffs began over the weekend. Entering Tuesday, all four series were tied 1-1, for the first time in history. This year, the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Yankees clinched the best records during the regular season in the National and American Leagues, respectively. The Dodgers, with 98 wins, had the most wins in all of baseball, this year. Yankees and Dodgers are the quintessential names in baseball, somewhat akin to the Lakers and Celtics in basketball. The two teams have met 11 times in the World Series, with the Yankees prevailing 8 times. The thing that helped make Yankees-Dodgers compelling baseball was, before the Dodgers moved to Los Angels, they played in Brooklyn. Not only that, but before moving to San Francisco, the Giants played in the Polo Grounds in Upper Manhattan. You can almost imagine the electricity of having three Major League Baseball teams in one city. While the Dodgers and Giants pursued westward expansion, they both landed in the same state, so their rivalry continued. Meanwhile, back in New York, the Mets entered the cityscape in 1962, and in 1969, the Miracle Mets won the World Series. That’s a story for another day. 

 

Today, of course football is far and away America’s Game. It unlikely that unless one is an adult male of a certain age, one would even recognize what Fall Classic pertains to. And while anyone who knows me could tell you, I’m no football fan, I also can no longer lay claim to the title baseball fan. I do still pull for the Dodgers, but I haven’t watched them play a non-World Series game in decades. So yeah, that means I haven’t watched a Dodger’s game since the 2020 World Series (in which they defeated the Tampa Devil Rays). But who knows? The World Series is set to begin October 25^th. The Dodgers have been beastly during the regular season, and ghastly during the playoffs in recent years. The San Diego Padres, another Cali foe seems to have their number. The beat the Dodgers last night to take a 2-1 lead in the best of 5 Series. It would be a shame to waste the best record in baseball; GO DODGERS! “The Fall Classic: It’s About That Time!”

 

I’m done; holla back!

 

Read my blog anytime by clicking the link: http://thesphinxofcharlotte.com. Find a new post each Wednesday.

 

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James Earl Carter, Jr.: Centenarian

It's time to Break It Down!

Jimmy Carter, the 39^th president of the United States, set a record yesterday, October 1, when he observed his birthday, and became the first American president to reach triple digits.

 

It’s a milestone more and more Americans will reach in the years to come – and frankly, it’s something for which our national social safety net is unprepared.

 

Carter left office in 1981 after Ronald Reagan defeated him in his reelection bid. He was 56, at the time, too young for Social Security and Medicare.

 

A very long, incredible retirement

 

Carter opted not to follow the traditional post presidential path of dedicating himself to sitting on corporate boards and raking in speaking fees.

 

Instead, Carter got his hands dirty building houses, took on peace missions to Cuba and the Middle East, negotiated the release of hostages, lived in his hometown, taught Sunday school and college classes, wrote books, and won Grammys.

 

His has been, indisputably, the longest, most righteous and most productive post-presidency in history, although John Quincy Adams’ post-presidential, anti-slavery efforts in Congress get honorable mention.

 

In the nearly 44 years since leaving office, Carter helped essentially eradicate Guinea worm, a parasite that infected around 3.5 million people in the mid-’80s and just 14 in 2023, according to The Carter Center.

 

It’s been 22 years since he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002, just as the US was preparing for war in Iraq. Carter also paid a landmark visit to Cuba that year.

 

It’s been nine years since Carter announced at a news conference that he had been diagnosed with brain cancer and might not have long to live.

 

CNN’s Stephen Collinson wrote at the time:

 

“I have had a wonderful life,” Carter said with the same unsparing honesty and meticulous detail that marked his presidency. “I’m ready for anything and I’m looking forward to new adventure,” Carter said, in the 40-minute appearance before the cameras, in which he frequently beamed his huge smile and never fell prey to emotion. “It is in the hands of God, whom I worship.”

 

Carter had more to do

 

By December 2015, Carter announced that after treatment, the cancer was gone. A timeline of his life maintained by CNN’s research library has many more notable entries.

 

It’s been nine years since Carter published an autobiography, “A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety.” He won a Grammy Award – his second – for the audiobook. He would win a third a few years later.

 

It’s been seven years since he was hospitalized for dehydration in Winnipeg, Canada, where he was outdoors – still working! – for Habitat for Humanity, the organization with which he had a long association.

 

It’s been five years since he won that third Grammy in 2019, broke his hip and joked that there should be an age limit on the presidency since he couldn’t have done the job at 80. He also turned 95 that year, and became the longest-living American president, surpassing George H.W. Bush.

 

It’s been nearly two years since Carter entered hospice care and almost a year since his wife, Rosalynn, died. They were married in 1946.

 

More people will turn 100

 

As remarkable as Carter made his years since American voters retired him from the White House, there’s also something increasingly normal about people living to 100.

 

Former presidents, all well-to-do and protected by a generous pension, aren’t a representative sample of society, but it’s notable that the four oldest former presidents – Carter, Bush, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan – all lived in the 21st century.

 

Overall, US life expectancy dropped during the Covid-19 pandemic. It has not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels, and it lags behind other developed countries, according to an analysis by KFF. As of 2022, the life expectancy for US males was 74.8 and for US females was 80.2.

 

But the population of 100-year-olds is expected to quadruple in the coming decades, according to Pew Research Center. It estimated in January that the current number of centenarians was around 101,000 and that the figure would increase to about 422,000 within 30 years, a small but growing portion of the US population as the average age increases and the birth rate declines. Today, celebrate “James Earl Carter, Jr.: Centenarian!”

 

I’m done; holla back!

Read my blog anytime by clicking the link: http://thesphinxofcharlotte.com. Find a new post each Wednesday.

To subscribe, click on Follow in the bottom right-hand corner of my Home Page at http://thesphinxofcharlotte.com; enter your e-mail address in the designated space, and click on “Sign me up.” Subsequent editions of “Break It Down” will be mailed to your in-box.

For more detailed information on a variety of aspects relating to this post, consult the links below:

 

https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/30/politics/jimmy-carter-presidents-what-matters/index.html

 

https://www.axios.com/2024/10/01/jimmy-carter-100-birthday-president-record

http://thesphinxofcharlotte.blogspot.com/2024/10/james-earl-carter-jr-centenarian.html