A Shot in the Arm

I turned 65 a few days ago, so I celebrated by getting a flu shot. Personally, I’m a big believer in vaccines. That is partly based on the science involved, and partly based on personal and family experience.

Back in the 50s and 60s when I was growing up, there weren’t as many vaccines available as there are now, and I ended up having a number of “childhood diseases.” One of them nearly killed me. When I was in the first grade, I had chicken pox, mumps, and measles, all within a period of a couple of months. It was while I was battling measles that my fever shot up to about 105°. I remember being in bed and “seeing” snakes crawling up and down the wall in my room. I ended up with a terrible kidney infection that put me in the hospital for a week. You can bet that when our kids were little, we made sure they had all their shots.

I also remember being in elementary school and standing in line to get a sugar cube with the polio vaccine on it, and the stories my parents told me about their classmates and cousins, pre-vaccine, who contracted polio and ended up crippled or in an iron lung. A generation before that, it was smallpox. My dad (born in 1928) carried a small round scar on his left shoulder where he received his smallpox inoculation.

Over the years, I have had numerous vaccines. I get a flu shot every year. I used to catch the flu about every other year. It would always make me sick as a big dog, and it seemed to be a month or six weeks before I was completely over it. So I don’t mess around about it anymore – I just get the shot and am done with it. It may make me feel a little “blah” for a day or two, but that’s a lot better than six weeks.

I have also been blessed to go on a couple of short-term mission trips to Central and South America. There was a long list of shots that I had to get when I was preparing to go to Peru a few years ago. I was in line with several other people for a yellow fever vaccination, and some of the folks were complaining about having to get “so many shots” for such a relatively short trip. The clinic director told us, with a seriousness that I did not mistake, that we would be given a card proving our vaccinated status, and that we needed to keep it with our passports. “Just remember,” she told us, “you don’t have to have that card to leave the country. But you will need it if you want to get back in.”

Today, thank God, we don’t have to worry about smallpox, or polio, or a whole host of other diseases, and it’s because of vaccines. Vaccines for kids do NOT cause autism. That was a rumor that was started back in the 1990s because of a published report by a British surgeon ­– except he had falsified the numbers in his study. He lost his medical license because of that lie, but the rumor persists. And the Covid vaccine does not make you sterile, it doesn’t implant microchips in your body, and it’s not the Mark of the Beast. And no, it’s not perfect, but if you get Covid, the likelihood is that you will have a relatively mild case. And the main side effect of the vaccine is, you don’t die from Covid – about 99.95% of the time.

So please, if you haven’t had yours yet, go get a Covid vaccine. Now that they have approved the booster for Moderna shots, I plan to get mine soon. And while you’re at, you can also get a flu shot – they’re saying that this flu season could be one of the worst in years.

Some people claim that requiring a vaccine somehow impinges on their “personal freedom,” but the truth is, there are all kinds of restrictions that we agree to abide by, in order to live among others as part of a community. You don’t have the “freedom” to drive your vehicle if you’re drunk. You don’t have the freedom to yell “Fire!” in a crowded theatre.

When the framers of the United States Constitution were drafting the Preamble to that historic document, part of their purpose, they said, was to “promote the general Welfare.” We need to recognize that we have responsibilities to our neighbors to behave in a way that promotes health and wellness as part of the “general Welfare” of the entire community. And surely that is also included in what Jesus meant when He told us to “love our neighbor.”

Looking Back at a Year Gone By

It’s hard to believe but this week marks the completion of my first full year with the Haskell Star. And what a year it’s been! So here are some things that come to my mind as I reflect upon the twelve months that have gone by.

New Community Leadership. This has certainly been a year of transition and change. For one reason or another, we have new leadership in several key areas of the community. Michelle Stevens is the new CEO at Haskell Memorial Hospital. Lonnie Hise has returned to Haskell to assume the duties of Superintendent for Haskell CISD. Coach Mitch McLemore, remembered with such respect from his days in Stamford, has taken over as Haskell’s Athletic Director and Head Football Coach. And last but not least, June Ellis has begun his tenure as Haskell’s City Administrator, bringing his financial management experience to our city’s benefit.

And they are not the only ones – just in the last few weeks, the DCOH Director and the Haskell Chamber of Commerce Director have both resigned, for unrelated reasons. Of course, this means we will soon be having new leadership in those key positions, as well.

We welcome all these folks to their new posts and pray for their success, because to paraphrase outgoing President George H.W. Bush’s comments to incoming President Bill Clinton, their success will be Haskell’s success. They will undoubtedly bring some new ways of thinking and fresh ideas with them – AND THAT’S A GOOD THING! We can’t solve tomorrow’s problems with yesterday’s answers, so before we write off some “new-fangled” approach because “we’ve never done it that way,” let’s be willing to listen, to learn, and perhaps to grow.

Remember, every great idea was once just somebody’s harebrained scheme.

Haskell is Booming. Some of us were born here; others of us got here as soon as we could. (A few of us came and left and came back!) But however it happened, we are happy to be in Haskell, and we recognize the blessings of being part of a vibrant community. Part of that vibrancy is a growing number of businesses and an expanding economic base. Our Development Corporation of Haskell, the DCOH, has been a valuable part of that expansion.

Just in the last few weeks, we have seen new businesses and restaurants come in, and existing ones expand and grow. Some of these include Kaleidoscope, with its numerous venues for crafters and local artists to show their merchandise; Sunnybell Florist & Gift Shoppe, now open on the north side of the square; HASK – Roewe Outfitters, catering to this area’s hunting needs and outdoor tourism; The Ugly Mug Kitchen, planning to open soon for coffee, breakfast, and lunch; and Vista Bank, which recently moved into the historic bank building on the northwest corner of the square. The new P6 Tire Store is having their Grand Opening next month, and let’s not forget the Historic Jones & Cox Building, on the southwest corner, now providing another much-needed venue for concerts and meetings.

The Drug Store has recently changed owners but kept its commitment to service. The new Texas Star Museum honors local history. Modern Way Grocery Store & Ace Hardware celebrated their 40^th anniversary a few months back. ALL our community’s establishments – new and old – deserve to be celebrated. More than that, they just want a chance. They are the ones who support our kids, our schools, and our churches, not to mention the Scouts, the athletic programs, the livestock show, and more. They are the businesses that donate and contribute so much to our way of life. They understand that they have to compete for the dollars that you spend. But before you head off to Abilene to shop at some Big Box retailer that doesn’t care about our community, please give our local businesses a chance to earn your business.

And finally, one bit of unhappy news –

Get the Shot. Coronavirus numbers are surging again. Infection rates are rising, as are the number of fatalities. Hospital ICU admissions are swelling, even at Hendrick, with dangerously rising Covid rates. And this time, it’s not primarily among the elderly, but among 20-40-year-olds. Literally thousands of children being orphaned by this disease.

And the sad part is, this time, it’s pretty much all preventable. They’re now calling it “The Pandemic of the Unvaccinated.”

I truly don’t understand how or why the decision to get vaccinated became such a politically charged controversy. It shouldn’t be – it’s a health issue, pure and simple. Yes, there are a relative handful of so-called “Breakthrough” cases, of people who have been fully vaccinated but contracted the disease anyway, but the overwhelming number of this latest wave of fatalities – something literally above 99% – are folks who could have gotten the shot, but out of pride, or fear, or some kind of stupid macho nonsense, or to make a political statement, chose not to.

The longer it takes us as a nation to become fully vaccinated, the more of these virus mutations will keep popping up, and the longer the economy will take to recover. Well over 600,000 of our fellow citizens have already died. It shouldn’t matter if you’re a Republican or a Democrat, a watcher of Fox News or CNN – just get the damn shot. Please. For yourself. For your family. For the country.

My Coronavirus Vaccine

I got my Coronavirus vaccine the other day, and I feel fine. I’m also very thankful for it.

A little background: I’m in group “1-B.” That group is people who are 65 and older, or who are between 16 and 64 but have other health conditions that make them susceptible to having a more serious case of the virus. So even though I’m “only” 64, having Diabetes qualified me to get the vaccine.

Pharmacist Intern Bria Brooks, of The Drug Store, gives me my Coronavirus vaccine.

I’m a big believer in vaccines. To his dying day, my dad had a small, circular scar high up on his left arm, near his shoulder, where he got the smallpox vaccine when he was young. I remember in elementary school being given a sugar cube with the polio vaccine in it. I also remember almost dying when I was in the first grade from the measles; my fever was so high, I remember having hallucinations of snakes crawling up and down my bedroom wall. And I was terrified of snakes. So when our kids came along, I was very happy to get them vaccinated to protect them from measles. And mumps. And a host of other childhood diseases.

All of that to say, for me, getting a vaccine is a no-brainer. My faith tells me that all healing comes from God, but I also believe that God grants some people the gift of healing through the use of medicine, research, and yes, vaccines to help us not get sick in the first place. I get a flu shot every year because I hate getting the flu. I’ve had to be vaccinated for all sorts of diseases that we don’t even have in this country, so that I could be a part of the team for various overseas mission trips.

Coronavirus is serious stuff. It is NOT a hoax, NOT something that only happens on TV or in big cities, and it is NOT something you can ignore if you’re young and healthy. I have lost several friends to it locally, including my good friend and former boss, Ken Lane, along with a dear former pastor of mine in East Texas, Robley Soileau. (Yes, he was a Cajun.) My son Drew had two friends – both healthy young men in their 20s – who died from it in Dallas. My brother in Houston is in the hospital right now with complications from it. I have another friend in Abilene, a health care worker, who nearly died from it right after Thanksgiving; he was hospitalized for weeks and has still not fully recovered.

So I registered for my turn, and I was delighted the other day when I received a call from The Drug Store, telling me that I could come to the Haskell Civic Center and receive my shot. They asked me a few questions to make sure I was eligible and told me when to be there and what to bring. I showed up that morning; it was a reasonably well-organized and smooth process, and I was in and out of there in well under an hour.

I received the Moderna vaccine. It was relatively painless, and I have had no reaction from it. I will have to get the follow-up shot in a few weeks, but I’ve had other two-dose vaccines like that before, and it’s not a big deal.

Let me say this as directly as I can: Get the shot. Get it as soon as you can. We have buried enough people, lost enough time and money, cast enough blame, and made more than enough excuses about why we can’t / shouldn’t / won’t comply. Don’t believe the conspiracy theories – this vaccine is not going to implant a microchip in you or wire you into the 5G network. It doesn’t alter your DNA, it won’t give Bill Gates control over your mind, and ladies, it will not cause infertility.

Those theories are on the same level as wearing hats made out of aluminum foil, to prevent the government from doing secret radio experiments on your brain.

And for a while longer, until we have a majority of folks vaccinated, let us keep on wearing masks, washing our hands, avoiding big crowds, and observing all the proper protocols. Please.

I know we’re all tired of it. But too many loved ones have already died.