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Gary,Some thoughts/comments in response to Lynn Halvorson Ottos’s item on writing.  I’m sure it saddens many that writing personal letters has become a lost art form.  And I believe that because of that society in general will experience a major loss of recorded family histories.  Here in NC (and I believe in VA also) there has recently been discussions to stop teaching cursive in public school.  It would be easy to consider that a dumb idea, but from a practical point of view, it seems to fit with the direction of and advancements in technology and the way most people choose to correspond today.  Not only has personal communications become a matter of short emails, text messages and tweets, but more and more business in being conducted in the same manner.  Less and less correspondence is being carried out via hand written letters (or even typed letters).  And we can see one effect of that by just looking at the sad shape of the U.S Postal Service.In my personal life I have spent virtually all of my adult life on the East Coast.  So up until her death in 2001, I exchanged several personal (written) letters with my mother every year.  It was our way of communicating.  I always looked forward to receiving letters from her because she not only had such beautiful penmanship but she could, and did, pack in all kinds of news about each of my siblings as well as news on everyone I knew (or may have known).  Foolishly, I did not keep all those wonderful pieces of correspondence from my mother – something I will now regret for the rest of my life.  But all was not lost.  Unbeknown to me, my mother did keep all the letters I wrote to her and upon her death I got them all back.  What a wonderful gift she gave me.  In those letters I now have a somewhat chronicled personal history (one sided only, unfortunately) of my life and all the events in my children’s lives as they were growing up.  I plan on making copies of all those letters so I can pass that family history on to each of my children.

Thanks Gary for providing us this unique forum.  And, I do hope Bernadette is doing well.

Keith Pladson(66)

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The priest who won’t call a golf cheat a naughty name.

A fellow was getting ready to tee off by himself on the first hole when a tall, stately, grey haired gentleman approached and asked if he could join him.

The first man said that he usually played alone, but agreed to the twosome.

They were even after the first two holes.

The tall, stately gentleman said, We’re about evenly matched, how about playing for five bucks a hole?’

The first fellow said he was a pretty good player, and that he wasn’t much for betting, but agreed to the terms, thinking we’re pretty even so far, so why not?

The stately gentleman played ‘straight & true’ golf the rest of the round and won the remaining sixteen holes with ease.

As they were walking off the 18th green, and while counting his $80, the tall, stately golfer confessed that he was the teaching pro at a neighboring course and liked to pick on suckers.

The first fellow revealed that he was the parish priest.

The pro got all flustered and apologetic, offering to return the money.

The priest said, ‘You won fair and square and I was foolish to bet with you. You keep your winnings.’

The pro said, ‘Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?’

The priest said, ‘Well, you could come to mass on Sunday and make a donation. And, if you want to bring your mother and father along, I’ll marry them.’

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