Tuesday, April 16, 2024
Sam Houston
FROM MY FRONT PORCH
Sam Houston is the publisher of the Hood County News. He is also an actor, author, playwright, performer and entertainment producer/promoter.
This past weekend several Dallas Cowboys football greats were inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame. Drew Pearson, Cliff Harris, and former head coach Jimmy Johnson all got their gold Hall of Fame jackets and become part of football history forevermore.
For me, one of the best moments of the induction was listening to coach Johnson’s speech. I am sure there were a great many people who wondered what he would have to say about his former boss Jerry Jones. The two did not have a particularly amicable separation and there has been a tense relationship between the two ever since Johnson left the team.
Some think Jerry wanted too much of the credit for the Cowboys success in the 90s. Others feel like Jimmy was out of line in his past comments of Mr. Jones. Interestingly, Johnson started his address by thanking Jerry Jones for allowing him to coach the Cowboys, and he also stated with emphasis, “WE built the great Cowboys teams of the 90.”
Over the weekend, Jones also announced Johnson would soon be joining the Cowboys Ring of Honor. The two old college teammates publicly made strong positive statements about each other. Maybe all the conflict and squabbling of the past is over, and two Cowboy Hall of Famers can share the limelight and the glory of days gone by, standing side by side with a smile on their face. Maybe bygones are now bygones! I sure hope so.
SCHOOL TIME AGAIN
Is it really time to start school again?
Earlier this week I got a wake-up call on just how darn old I had become. In my mind we should be celebrating Valentine’s Day, or Easter at the latest, but no, time has flown by and it is just about time for school to start!
How could that possibly be? Seems like summer just got started and now the Cowboys have already had an exhibition game, the retailers just had their “tax-free weekend,” and I heard my first advertisement about Labor Day weekend!
I had visits from multiple staff members from GISD as they were out conducting a scavenger hunt as part of a team building exercise. Three or four groups of teachers stopped by the newspaper and thanked us for coverage of local schools. Dr. Jeremy Glenn (the GISD’s superintendent) was part of one of the groups!
When I think about middle school teachers I imagine middle aged women in dresses, and those low-heeled shoes of the style my teachers wore when I was in the 7th grade. When the Acton Middle school staff stopped by my office, I thought I was being visited by high school students, not teachers! How did teachers get to be so young? The ones I remember were “old” and seemed like grandmothers. The truth is the only person who was old in our conversation was me!
It was very nice to have some of the school staff come by the newspaper, and I think they were excited to learn of the extensive school coverage we are planning this school year. It will not be long until the school buses roll, classes start, and homework begins. Let’s hope the school year is safe and positive for all!
Thought for the day: When friends forgive each other, they lift the weight off their shoulders that had kept them from growing into the kind of men they always wished to be.
Until next time…
sam@hcnewws.com
