FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2017
4 — THE BAKER COUNTY PRESS
Opinion / Politics
— Special Column —
— Guest Opinion —
An open
letter to the
NFL
So I was
thinking ...
Citified
By Taya Kyle
Dear NFL,
You were doing your part to bring
people together and heal the world.
That’s really how healing works. We
heal by loving each other and leading
by example; showing people what is
possible when we love each other just
as we are and not only recognize our
differences but celebrate them and
look at how we can use them together
to make us jointly better than our
separate parts. You were doing your
part celebrating each other based on
skills, talent and a joint vision without
regard to color and religion.
You were doing your part and we
were doing ours. We showed up
cheering and groaning together to as
one. We talked in the concession lines
and commiserated and celebrated our
team together. Did it ever occur to you
that you and we were already a mix
of backgrounds, races and religions?
We were already living the dream you
want, right in front of you.
Your desire to focus on division and
anger has shattered what many people
loved most about the sport. Football
was really a metaphor for our ideal
world —different backgrounds, tal-
ents, political beliefs and histories as
one big team with one big goal—to do
well, to win, TOGETHER.
You are asking us to abandon what
we loved about togetherness and make
choices of division. Will we stand
with you? Will we stand with our
flag? What does it mean? What does it
mean if we buy a ticket or NFL gear?
What does it mean if we don’t? It is
the polar opposite of the easy togeth-
erness we once loved in football.
It was simple—we loved you and
By Jimmy Ingram
Special to The Baker County Press
Submitted Photo
Taya Kyle is the widow of deceased
Navy SEAL Chris Kyle.
you loved us—with all of our races,
religions, different backgrounds and
politics. Simplicity in a crazy world
was pretty awesome.
You dear NFL, have taken that. You
have lost me here.
If you ever want to get off your
knees and get to work on building
bridges, let me know. I have found
screaming about the problems in
service marriages or even standing in
silence in front of them, hasn’t healed
even one of them.
On the other hand, funding the Chris
Kyle Frog Foundation, building a
team and rolling up my sleeves to get
in the trenches during my “off time”
—volunteering there outside of my
paying jobs— has proven to make real
change.
You have a lot of strong guys, I am
sure in the off season a lot of them
could build some pretty big bridges if
they care enough to do the hard work.
That would involve getting off their
knees and getting to work though. If
I can do it while I raise two kids as
their only parent and work through
the greatest pain of my life, let’s see if
they can do it for the issues they say
they care so much about.
Go Longhorns and Sic ‘Em …
Sincerely,
Taya
Oregon budget highlights
L-R Segmented from bottom to top
Graphics courtesy of the Oregon Legislature.
The legislatively adopted budget (LAB) for the 2017-19 biennium is $74.390 billion total
funds, an increase of $2.569 billion from the 2015-17 legislatively approved budget of
$71.821 billion, or a gain of 3.6%. The increase between the two biennia is, in part,
due to the authorization to spend $1.844 billion more in General Fund in the 2017-19
biennium than was spent in 2015-17. This 10.2% increase in General Fund expendi-
tures continues a recent trend of biennial double-digit percentage increases. Detailed
breakdowns are available at: www.oregonlegislature.gov/lfo/Documents/2017-19%20
Budget%20Highlights.pdf
My family made a recent weekend
trip to Seattle.
As a lover of most things Northwest,
this rural-American boy enjoys seeing
the sites and culture of its few large
cities.
Sports, some history, and good mu-
sic are just a few things I love to take
in over a long weekend. Here are a
few things I don’t care to take in.
Traffic: What better welcome to let
you know you’ve arrived in the city
than the fiery red glow of hundreds of
brake lights in front of you.
The flashing beacons instantly
remind you that dinner is now at 9
p.m. instead of 6, and that you should
have stopped to go to the bathroom 30
miles ago.
In 20-yard increments you carry on,
searching through awful radio stations
for a song to calm you down.
Ironically you find a classic rock sta-
tion playing Sammy Hagar’s “I can’t
drive 55.” Contrary to the meaning of
Hagar’s song, his chorus DOES prove
correct: You ... can’t ... drive ... 55(!)
or 25, or even five. At this point being
able to read the traffic sign you first
saw in the distance 15 minutes ago
feels like a victory.
Parking: One of the benefits of
rural living is ample parking. Park
just about anywhere that’s NOT in
someone else’s way and you won’t
be ticketed, laughed at, honked at, or
bothered in the least.
Don’t have any change? It doesn’t
matter because you don’t need any.
You can park any place you want for
free.
Parking in a metropolitan area
resembles trying to cram that last dirty
dish in the dishwasher: you know it’s
not going to fit, but you’re going to try
and make it happen anyway.
After 30 minutes of driving in circles
hoping someone will leave you a
reasonably sized parking spot (pro tip:
they aren’t) you submit to the parking
garage.
Your truck/SUV is within 1/8” of the
chain-hung maximum height indica-
tor, which gives you pause enough
to wonder if your vehicle is about to
accidentally become a convertible.
You grab your ticket and make it
past the first overhead beam safely.
You avoid glancing at the parking
rates on the way in because sometimes
ignorance is bliss.
This bliss will come to an end hours
later when you realize it cost you $26
to park in the garage for the day. This
is all based on the assumption you live
long enough to find your car in the
garage since you can’t remember if
you parked on level J, K, or L.
At this moment you are reminded
again why you live in a small town.
Honking: There’s something espe-
cially obnoxious about car horn honk-
ers to me. It’s like someone yelling at
you without saying a word.
And no one loves to honk more than
people in the city. Someone appears to
be in need of your parking spot. Are
you taking too long to buckle your kid
up in their car seat? Honk.
Do you need to fasten your own?
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claimer: Opinions submitted as Guest
Submitted Photo
Jimmy Ingram is a local farmer and
father of two who enjoys people
watching within our wonderful
community and beyond.
Honk again. Are you an elderly person
taking too long in the crosswalk.
Honk, honk, honk.
I feel like car manufacturers should
have a 20 honk limiter on their horns
for the life of a car. Like a ration of
sorts on the amount of obnoxiousness
a vehicle can put out during its life.
The horn honkers of the world may
think long and hard before wasting 5%
of their allotment on you for taking to
long to back out of your parking spot.
The same spot you spent 30 minutes
trying to find after leaving the $26
parking garage.
You’ll leave when you’re good and
ready.
The cost of food: In small town
America $15 can normally buy you
a really good meal. $5 can buy you
a drink. Not in the city. City food is
special.
Note the key phrases like “free-
range,” “organically harvested,” and
whole portions of the menu dedicated
to “Vegan.”
While I have no issue with any of
these eating “principles,” I cant help
but wonder if it’s discriminatory that
“carnivore” doesn’t have its own
specified section on the menu.
I also know that these things come
at a cost. A $10 hamburger at a small
town cafe becomes $18 on a city
menu. Your favorite $4.50 IPA is sud-
denly $8. Appetizer? $16. No thanks.
“Ohh you have to go during happy
hour,” your city dwelling friends will
say. I couldn’t, I was stuck in traffic
for an hour and then couldn’t find a
parking spot.
The explanation of where you’re
from: I don’t find this annoying
as much as I do amusing. The “so
where are you from?” question. It’s
a friendly enough question and I do
realize places like Baker City aren’t
particularly noteworthy to PDX’ers
or Seattle-ites. But trying to explain
where it is typically has one of these
as a follow up...
“Is that in Idaho?”
“So, Eastern Oregon, like Bend?”
“I think I drove through there once.”
“Does it snow there?”
“Is there, like— mountains?”
“Ohh I think my mom’s third hus-
band had a second cousin from there.
You probably know him.”
Sometimes just for fun I like to an-
swer all questions and statements with
a “yes.” So to sum up: “Yes, I’m from
Bend Idaho, the snowy, mountainous
town you drove through once on your
way to visit your distant relative who
I happen to know so well that we had
dinner just last week.”
As much as I enjoy many parts of
Northwest cities, the feeling you get
when your arrive back home in your
barely-heard-of town is better.
Where you can park for free, eat and
drink on the cheap, and honking horns
are accompanied by a friendly wave
and not an impatient stare.
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