Passing days can be more

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Often times in life we fold over the calendar page only to see a date that marks a memory, an anniversary, a birthday, which we may or may not wish to experience again.

We mark our lives by milestones – graduations, weddings, funerals, and all that happens in between.

I recently read a wonderful article about the life of a cousin who passed at 103. She lived an amazing life touching many and impacting the history of my maternal ancestral home. Amazingly, I had reached out to her just a few weeks back but her hearing did not allow me to speak to her by phone, so I was going to write a letter that did not get completed in time.

For me, there are dates which pop out on the calendar for some reason. My grandma Kitty’s birthday – Jan. 5. My parents birth and death days. Though there are many fond Christmas memories from childhood, once I hit adulthood, Christmases became less pleasant, and the anniversaries are not a favorite but like everyone else, I manage often filling the void with special routines.

For years, I kept my life cycles by a calendar of annual musical performances returning to towns and festivals with music instruments in hand to bring a smile and hopefully move a crowd of enthusiastic music lovers.

While the annual cycles have fell by the wayside, I still fondly think of those times as the dates float by on the folding calendar page.

Is there a reason that we should dread the turning calendar page?

No, I don’t think so. Despite the passage of time and the inevitable wrinkles and graying hair that accumulates the more pages you toss away.

The special days should be ceased and cherished. The happy ones should be made happier with each passing opportunity. Create a new special memory attached to the day. If the memory is sad, find a way to create some happiness around it. With each passing happy moment, the accumulation of those over time, might just place the sadness deeper into the past.

It is up to us to decide whether we will be a slave to the past, or create opportunities that make tomorrow better for us.

Generations have come and gone upon whose shoulders we stand. Many knew little happiness, many knew much happiness. No matter their lot, it is safe to say they likely wanted more for their offspring and those that came beyond.

We owe it to them to make the best of the time we are afforded, not to dwell on the bad and the sad but work to improve what is around us with all our efforts.

Make a smile today, even if it simply while staring in the mirror. Your effort will be returned, even if its just by your reflection!

A quarter saved

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I placed the quarter in the hand of Uncle Sam and hit its trigger and the coin dropped down into the open bag below clicking to the bottom of the bank. It was a fun to save in a similar way my grandparent’s generation had.

While it taught me the tendency to save throughout my life, now as I look back, I wonder if the colorful design of Uncle Sam and his satchel was subliminal to train me to also put my money in the hands of Uncle Sam.

Don’t get me wrong; I have always given him his share. Needless to say, I didn’t have to smile like I did when I put it in Uncle Sam’s hand as a child.

Mechanical banks always were a fascination to me as a child and they were fun to watch as they collected their holdings.

My folks instilled in me a strong sense of saving. I had several small banks as a child until the day my mother went with me to open my own bank account. I saved for many of my big childhood items: the bicycle I wanted – an English racer; a push mower to start a lawnmower business; and many other things through the years.

Putting money back to pay for future bills, replace a vehicle, retirement, emergencies, and a myriad of other needs depending on the source of the revenue.

Those who came out of The Great Depression definitely had a different perspective about how to make the most of everything. Things just didn’t go in the trash if there was any chance something might be repurposed. Paper towels and napkins were torn in two. Aluminum foil and when salvageable plastic wrap was washed for reuse. Coffee grounds and tea bags were used twice. Clothes got patches. Sock holes were repaired.

Many had learned most of the lessons of their parents and could garden, can and store foods, fix vehicles, tools, appliances and most anything. They had learned the skills of hunting, fishing and trapping and how to process the meat those endeavors provided.

For those who are blessed to have some of these skills passed to them, you will have a leg up as we all may walk an unfamiliar path in the coming months.

I remember the stories they shared about the bank runs and the thousands of closures that followed in the 1930s, but the Great Depression followed.

As I write this, we saw our first modern day large bank run which resulted in closure. Although after the news of the closure, it appears a government plan may be in place to salvage things. But even if they do, no matter what they say, that means someone else has to pay for it. Two other banks closed in the same week. Hopefully, that will be the end of the process.

I have always been called an optimist. In case my optimism does not pan out, brush up on your skills, live local, strengthen friendships and prepare.

TV’s “In the Heat of the Night” hits 35

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We mark our lives in time by the passage of time. We celebrate birthdays and anniversaries and if we should hit longevity in our experiences, it generally involves many other people acknowledging the moment in our live.

In the United States, collectively, we just passed a marker in television history. The TV police drama series “In the Heat of the Night” debuted on NBC on March 6, 1988 – 35 years ago. A racially driven story line reaching back to the novels of John Ball and the Academy Award winning 1967 film by the same name but set in the 1980s South.

When it was started production only eight episodes were ordered. While creating so few is not unusual today, then a season order was 22 episodes. It gives me the feeling that those in charge at the networks didn’t really see the staying power of such a show and the appeal it would gain from the viewers.

Those eight episodes made the show a runaway hit appealing to the residents of small and medium size towns across the country and with them they took city viewers who connected with the small town experience.

In creating the show the developers working with MGM/UA selected Carroll O’Connor as “Chief Bill Gillespie” and Howard Rollins as “Det. Virgil Tibbs” to lead an amazing ensemble of actors who brought to life the fictitious town of Sparta, Mississippi. For those of you from that state, you likely know there is a crossroads community by that name but not like the community on the screen in the series.

From left are In the Heat of the Night stars David Hart “Parker Williams,” Randall Franks “Officer Randy Goode,” and Alan Autry “Bubba Skinner” in the Sparta Police squad room. (Photo: Randall Franks Media – Ned D. Burris)

Casting directors and producers found an amazing mix of actors to depict the characters created for the new series – Alan Autry as “Bubba Skinner,” David Hart as “Parker Williams,” Christian Le Blanc as “Junior Abernathy” and Hugh O’Connor as “Lonnie Jamison” and Peter Gabb as “Horace Goode.”

That was the original police cast that instilled a desire for viewers to tune in every week.

As the network locked in a second season of 22 episodes and MGM/UA moved its on location filming surroundings from Hammond, Louisiana to Covington, Georgia, they also changed up the cast a bit leaving the characters of Junior Abernathy and Horace Goode. They added actor Geoffrey Thorne as “Willson Sweet.”

Covington and Georgia welcomed the show as it began it’s second season filming in August of 1988 and many new adventures. Hosting a TV series was a major economic coup for both the state and a medium size town like Covington. So, all the cast moved to their new hometown crossing their fingers for continued success of all the team to create engaging stories that viewers would connect with.

And connect they did. The show became a mainstay in the top 30 weekly shows. Alongside “Matlock” and “Midnight Caller,” NBC’s Tuesday night lineup ruled the ratings.

Audiences tuned in to see a group of actors playing small town Southerners who each week reacted to the impact of the problems and topics every community across America was dealing with at some level. How the writers, actors and directors depicted these issues, offered America options in how to overcome such issues, how everyone can get along together no matter our differences, how to live together in a community, and how to succeed against adversities.

Yes, it was generally a weekly story about a crime, murder, solving mysteries, and hopefully getting the bad guys and girls. But we watched because we wanted to see how these characters that became beloved by audiences were impacted and responded to whatever faced them.

The show went on to produce what they described as eight seasons of hour episodes and a few movies filming from 1988-1994 while airing both on NBC and eventually moving to CBS. At it’s height of foreign first run, 150 countries were watching the guys and girls of Sparta and the show was top 10 in several nations. The cast and crew garnered numerous award nominations for the Golden Globes, Emmys, and Image and others. And they took home 2 Image Awards, and American Cinema Editors Award, and Carroll O’Connor received an Emmy.

“In the Heat of the Night” stands alongside the greatest police dramas in TV history, and among the few Southern dramas ever produced for episodic television. We tend to look back nostalgically, while looking more harshly at our current time. The period of this show was not an easy one in America, it was a racially centered drama in a time when our country was dealing with several racially centered issues that were dominating news cycles.

The show from my prospective was a release valve, that allowed us to collectively look at issues, and find the reality of our communities within the stories, and the strengths we have when working together rather than being divided. I am thankful for the writers who wrote the stories, the directors that guided their creation, the actors who were the face of the American South in that period and even today.

While I was not there in the beginning, in the fall of 1988, the directors and producers created a character for a young country music artist who had an earnest desire to act, I was that young actor and “Officer Randy Goode” was born giving me five years of working with “Bubba,” “Parker,” “Lonnie” “Willson,” “Chief Gillespie” and “Det. Tibbs” and all those who eventually joined the police cast, some among them: Crystal Fox, Dee Shaw, C.C. Taylor, Mark Johnson, Harvey Lee and Barbara Lee-Belmonte, Sharon Pratt and John Webb. I created with these amazing people and lived a life in Sparta, a favorite town for so many TV viewers.

As we mark the 35th of the beginning, all I can say is it was “Sho nuff” a grand old time and I want to thank all of you who watched, laughed and cried along with our efforts while maybe playing some checkers along with me. Those who watched will get the last bit. You can learn more by visiting www.RandallFranks.com/in-the-heat-of-the-night or check out my Encouragers book series for more photos and in-depth experiences with stars and guest stars.

The Spirit within

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Have you ever been in a room, and someone walks in and with your body you feel in your center mass of your chest a quiver.

As they draw closer to you, the disturbance within increases in its frequency of movement. Of course, exposing this in a public situation would be uncomfortable, so instead you hold your composure and let it pass. Hopefully, the situation does not place the person in your orbit.

I have experienced this and over the years as I moved on with my life, where I had the opportunity have watched those that the quiver warned me about. I have surmised that the Spirit within me was warning me that there was something within that person that was not coming from a good place, and they did not intend the best through their actions.

There have been occasions when such a person did come into my orbit, and it was all that I could do to withstand the impact of that exposure.

I have had similar experiences while seeing people on the news or while watching a TV show or a movie.

This feeling is much like a magnet when it pushes the same pole end apart. It’s there to warn us to protect ourselves against the evil around us.

That comes in many packages, sometimes with legs, sometimes through what we watch, hear, read, and see.

If you intake things that uplift your Spirit, reinforce it and feed it with positive, uplifting messages, love for your fellow man, then that will be reflected in the actions of your heart.
If you allow things that damage your Spirit, that expose you to darkness, evil, sadness, then your Spirit hardens and the warning quiver fades because you have in essence chosen to ignore it, then your actions will more and more reflect those negatives that you allow to invade your body.

When I have not ignored its warnings, that Spirit has guided me safely through much of my life.

Although like any headstrong child – of any age – during some periods and on some days, I have lost my way, giving in to other senses and feelings allowing those to overshadow the Spirit. That has always been to my detriment, emotionally, sometimes physically and financially.

When it occurs, it weakens my Spirit, depletes my energy and scatters my focus. It saddens me when I realize that I stepped outside the blessings my companion offers.

I believe that the Spirit is God’s way to be present in our lives and to walk with us in all that we do. When we ignore it, we are choosing to follow our own will, which is a choice that He gave us. Sometimes though when we follow the Pied Piper down the path, at some point we will have to pay the piper. Our hope then must be that if we choose to walk another path that it does not lead to our destruction or into the total hardening of the Spirit within us, so we no longer recognize ourselves.

Let’s fill our minds, our hearts, our eyes, our ears with the uplifting Word and with images, stories, films and TV shows, that reinforce the good within us. Let’s cast off that which is meant to draw us into a downward spiral with some aspect of destruction inevitable.

Will I find it?

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There are times I find myself looking for something that had eluded me.

In childhood, one of my favorite Saturday morning shows was “The Land of the Lost.”

In the story line, humans fell through a crack in space and time to the period and place where they had to exist with dinosaurs.

I am not sure where that crack is they fell through. I have never seen it but I have a feeling that it simply appears and disappears at will.

I currently have a line of socks sitting on my ironing board with no mates.

The crack seems to be drawn to my dryer. While I generally have liked wearing matching socks, I

am beginning to think that trend will have to change in order to stay ahead of the losses.

Perhaps it has a magnetism, the crack simply appears when something desires to escape its surroundings and find new adventures.

I don’t know where those little items get to that seem to take the trip.

Eventually, though they find their way back and usually just slightly off from their original position no worse for the wear.

I imagine though some of them could write a book that only the other in adamant objects could appreciate.

I have often placed the disappearances especially on items like car keys or things which delay departure as simply an angelical nudge to prevent some unknown course of action which would not have been in my best interest.

Even those times pass as the item reveals itself and the original desired departure occurs.

Sometimes I wonder if they are lost or are we.

Are we searching in vain in this world trying to find something that we do not really need?

Is the path that is promised that is ahead what we have really lost?

As we look upon recent events both here at home and abroad, sometimes I feel that we all have now fallen through that crack into the land of the lost. It seems that the dinosaurs have taken a different form but they still put our future at peril.

In the increasing sequence of velocity of the negative, I am pleased to see through the crack the reverberations of those who are seeking the Light of God’s love, being drawn into Revival at points reaching out initially from the crack that revealed itself at Asbury in Kentucky.

Perhaps this crack will widen and allow many more of the Lost to be found, perhaps the socks will find their match, the keys will reappear with destination fully ready to receive all those with a willing heart.

May our land become the center of such rejoicing in God’s gifts that no one resides in the land of the lost.