Posts

Your word is your bond

/in /by

I have been told there was a time when a person was judged upon the words which emanated from his mouth.
A person’s character could be seen in his deeds and by what he would say and sometimes what he would not say.
I have met many people in my life. Some, I would not trust them as far as I could throw them, while others — if they say it, it will be done.
When two people struck a bargain and shook hands there was nothing else to do.
Today, however, we are in a world filled will reams of contracts, agreements and endless disclaimers and visits to a lawyer.
My grandpa Bill was a man of his word. If he said he would help with something, no matter what hardship it placed upon him, he would do it.
In my association with music legend Bill Monroe, I learned quickly that his honor was paramount in his image.
There was never a bargain struck or a promise made between he and I that he did not make come to pass.
I remember visiting with him before his final illness. He walked up to me and with the strength of a 20-year-old he squeezed my hand. He looked at me dead in the eye and said, “I tell you man, there are not that many good men left any more. Men like us need to stick together and help each other out.”
More than his praise of my musical ability or all the things he had done for me in my life, those few words conveyed to me that he thought of me as a man of my word.
Working in the world of television and film, I quickly learned the lesson that many Hollywood movers and shakers tend to be the opposite. Most of these trendsetters simply tell you what you want to hear rather than the truth. This trend relates more to the stars and executives of the last two to three decades.
There are and were what I call “class acts” such as the late stars Gene Autry, John Wayne and Roy Rogers whose word was their bond. I wish there were more people like them today.
I cannot tell you how many times someone has promised me they would use me in a movie project, and then when the project came along that promise was forgotten.
I am afraid I have found the same to be true in the “real” world as well.
Sometimes it just makes you want to lose faith in the entire human race when a person tells you he will do one thing and he does another.
In my own life, I have never broke a promise or not followed through with an agreement. Being a man of your word also carries through to fulfilling the everyday tasks that we all do. Returning phone calls, fulfilling requests, replying to mail are just a few of the little things that some folks might miss.I know that I have probably misstepped by not doing a few things that I have said I would do in my life. For those touched by such an action, I ask for forgiveness.
But I also know when I have told someone I would do something, usually such an assurance has popped up in my memory over and over again until I finish the task. There have been times I have carried one of those little things around in my head for a couple of years until I could do something about it.
But no matter what, I always did it.
Despite trends to the contrary and those who we discover are not honorable by their deeds and words, I believe it is the responsibility of every individual to make every effort to rise above such people to make our community a place of honor. It is what we owe our forefathers who built this land, and what we owe those who fight and die for our continued freedom.

Truth, nothing but the truth

/in /by

The importance of truth in everyday life is something that each of us are responsible for upholding.
When thinking on the topic of honesty, I fondly remember back on the Andy Griffith Show episode where “Opie” wants to sell his bike without mentioning all the little things that are wrong with it. “Barney” decides to take on selling real estate and the Taylors are considering selling their house and buying another in the same episode.
Andy neglects to mention the little odds and ends wrong with the house until Opie brings these things to the attention of the buyers. While Andy becomes frustrated by Opie’s honesty, Opie is confused by Andy’s separate rules for adults and children. Andy finally realizes that Opie is right.
When we are in our late teens, we sometimes add a few years to our age so we can do things adults do. As we get older, we tend to shave years off our age so we can appear younger. Are these lies?
When attorneys are faced with defending people that they know or suspect are guilty, does this strain their ability to be honest when they stand in front of a judge or jury to defend a not guilty plea?
While extreme situations like war can sometimes bring on the need for good people to be faced with challenging choices concerning their convictions, it is often on faith and truth that they must rely to get through the bad times.
But there are, no doubt, times when honesty may be strained.
Members of a generation of Americans were disenfranchised by the feeling that our government was lying to them in the 1970’s during Watergate and the latter part of the Vietnam War.
Were they lying?
There is an old joke about how you can tell when a politician is lying — their mouth is moving.
I wonder sometimes what happened to good, old-fashioned honesty.
Honesty does exist in each of us. All we need to do is remember each and every falsehood we utter has an effect on someone else.
It may only be ourselves we hurt as we build a house of cards trying to remember each and every white lie we have told so as not to be caught.
What is the point of being dishonest? Do we gain anything?
There’s an old song called the “Royal Telephone” where the singer asks the operator to get Jesus on the line.
Would you tell a lie in exchange for a conversation with our Savior, Jesus Christ himself, on the phone? I wouldn’t. If I did, what would we talk about?
Remember: “From your lips to God’s ears.”
If you remember that he is listening, it does make you think more heavily about what you do and say each and every day.

For truth, justice and the American way

/in /by

Never rely upon what “other people” say when you develop an opinion.

I have spent my life walking in the light of truth. I was taught early to follow the rules and speak the truth. As a small child, I was a whiz at numbers but had some difficulty with spelling, at least that is the way I felt at the time. In an early experience that I shared with my first-grade teacher, I was caught using a small note placed under my leg with my spelling words upon it while taking a test – cheating plain and simple.

Being caught I was sent out to stand in the hallway and then received a dressing down by my teacher which then resulted in my mother being called in and later my dad being brought in the loop for the final punishment at home.

Needless to say, I didn’t have the opportunity to hide a crib note under my leg when taking a spelling test again, I couldn’t sit comfortably for a while to take a test. But the experience re-enforced some of the lessons I had been taught – don’t cheat and don’t lie. A simple lesson learned is it’s much easier to tell the truth, you don’t have to remember and keep up with the lies.

Later in my life, as my career moved to journalism, spending a life in truth, being dependable and making sure no stone was unturned, allowed me to tell the stories of many folks who would not talk to other journalists, because they knew I would be fair and honestly share their story. That approach helped me earn over 20 state and national awards for the work. I fondly remember a boy who use to call me “Superman” because he thought of me like Clark Kent, saving the world.

As a journalist developing a story, I focused on getting three different sources who could confirm facts about a situation that may need to be brought to light in an article.

In recent weeks, I have experienced a lesson in the current human condition. There are folks in the world today that do not care about integrity of the information that they believe. They take the words at face value, placing no question on the source and the ultimate motives for what is being said. They do not look deeper to see if what is being said is even valid.

Some then use those words to formulate decisions that impact the lives of numerous people, to slander others with no foundation by repeating what has been said. That is now an easy adventure in our world which rotates around various social media platforms.

There is no accountability for those that do it. There is no way to fix the damage done by these people that propagate falsehoods and what is the sad commentary is some of them that choose this path are successful in hurting others and benefit from their efforts whether the ultimate gain is financial or gains in power within some position.

I have always believed that good wins over evil and still do. I read the back of the Book and that is how the story ultimately ends, but these little battles along the way that seems to allow evil people with evil intentions to succeed does dishearten. The only way to overcome it is if we all don’t believe blindly… do a little research and find three reputable sources when making decisions and conclusions that impact all of us. I pray for our people that we all do a better job of reaching for truth, justice and the American way.