Hypocrisy Toward The Heart of the Songwriter

Psalm 96:1, 98:1, 149:1, and Isaiah 42:10 all say to sing to the Lord a new song. Someone has to write these new songs. I am one of those people.

Recently in church, the sermon covered the story of the widow's mite. This story tells of richer people making a show of the money they were giving, but this woman making little of her contribution. While this is often used to illustrate that you should give no matter how bad it gets, the core of the usage this time had to do with where your heart is when you do what you do for God, and that you can do the right things for the wrong reasons.

This got me to thinking about volunteering at the church. Churches are usually pretty vocal about needing help since they thrive on their congregation stepping up to give of their time for teaching and literally everything else that goes on. They cry out for help and proclaim that you have a talent in something and they can it. Those who volunteer for some things are applauded for their willingness to sacrifice for the Lord and there is rarely, if ever, any question as to their motives or heart in the matter.

Unless you're a songwriter.

We have a campaign going for Feed My Starving Children, and someone was on stage a few weeks back who felt like she was called to help this campaign and be a big part of it. No small deal was made of this desire. However, if this person had said, "The Lord has called me to write music for his people," the vetting and doubt would still be going on. I know this because I write music. It has been implied not very subtlely that my heart is not in the right place by more than one person.

So a person can be revered because they feel called in one area, but completely shut down if called in another? If I said I'm up for teaching the youngsters, I'd be ushered in without question. Heck, even as a stage musician, there was very little vetting when it came to playing the existing music. Someone has to play it, right?

Let's talk about a calling for just a moment. How does one know they are called to do a certain thing? I've struggled with this for a long time because I've been met with so much resistance in what I do. Being a writer of anything is very hard, disheartening work because unless you are "known," no one believes in you. Period. The way I see a calling of any kind is that it is something that no matter how hard you try to leave it behind, it continues to come back. No matter how much you want to do something else, you keep circling back around to that one thing. No matter how much something has hurt you, beat you down, or how much other people have given you so much crap over what you've done, you can't ever escape it. Your heart is continually drawn right back to that thing to try it again.

I've been so done so many times, and yet, I keep writing music. I've wanted to leave every bit of it behind so many times, but I can't. I can't stop writing it. I can't stop playing. I have to be a part of it. No matter how hard I try to escape or how harsh the comments are or how much pain I've experienced as a resulting of trying over and over, I continue to return because only within it do I actually find peace.

I've most recently taken to writing songs with a friend of mine under the moniker of Kingdom Song. We have a couple dozen posted on YouTube, not for the glory of ourselves, but because in order for songs to be heard, someone has to play them. No one else will, so we'll sing the new songs to the Lord ourselves so that others can hear, share, and maybe even use them. Will they fit everyone? Nope. But some might.

Is my heart in the right place? I want to think so, and since I'm so conscientious of it, it probably is. The problem with being in this sort of capacity is it can very easily translate into praise for self instead of praise for God. It's easy to point to a songwriter belting out one of their own songs and say that he just wants attention. And yet, no one accuses a preacher, who writes a new sermon every week, of performing for himself. How is this different? A person stands before a congregation and gives a speech about Godly things that he wrote himself. Why accuse a songwriter of being self-centered when there is actual, scriptural reference for singing to the Lord a new song?

A songwriter can actually add quite a bit to a church if they would open their minds to the possibilities. True, it takes more talent from a worship band to play something where the arrangement has to be created, but as long as you don't do an entire set of new music, you find the time. "Sing to the Lord a new song" is in scripture four times. We are to worship the Lord, but he not only wants to hear us, he has given us talents to make something new, and he wants to hear that too. Something there that many times means something.

So don't question the heart of the songwriter. Like so many other things, there are those out for themselves, but just because it is something creative doesn't mean their heart isn't in it for the right reasons. "But you just did a whole blog post complaining about it," you may have just said. This blog post was because I was hurt by those who questioned my motives in what I am compelled to do. This post is a cry to those who turn a deaf ear to not just me, but everyone out there who wants to sing the to Lord a new song whether they want to hear it or not. This post is a reminder that just because something is public, that doesn't mean the heart of its creator isn't with the heart of THE creator.

"Sing to the Lord a new song." The Bible says it. I believe it. And if you look around, you'll find someone who can write it.

Broken Arrow Split Would Dissolve Pride Marching Band

A plan was presented to us in Broken Arrow in March 2017 to deal with the current population growth in the school system by using both the current high school campus and the freshman academy campus as full 9-12 high schools. It was a plan so overwrought with problems and unanswered questions that the district indicated that they were going to slow down, form committees, and answer questions before deciding on any proposal. Our hope is that the proposal died that day and something new will come up. We're not 100% certain of this, and as such, I wish to post about the scariest aspect of the plan: the dissolution of the biggest national and international celebrity in Broken Arrow, the Pride of Broken Arrow marching band.

I know it seems odd that a marching band would be a celebrity, and like a prophet in his hometown, Broken Arrow doesn't give it much thought, but outside of our town, it's renowned. The majority of the town has no idea what they have. When it comes to its loss, the military would refer to it as "collateral damage." Because of Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activity Association rules, the city cannot have a single marching band represent separate high schools, and the directors basically confirmed that if such a plan passed, the Pride of Broken Arrow will be no more.

The reason for this sudden end to the nationally recognized ensemble is that with the dilution of the talent across the city, and the fact that the only way for a school to get an annual sweepstakes award is for that school to excel in both marching and concert band, each school will need to require that every student enrolled in band participate in marching band at each school. Since the marching band will have to move from optional extracurricular back to required, it is felt that asking students to pay the fees currently associated with Pride to be unreasonable, and lower fees mean the big national trips will have to end. Beyond that, the Pride is a very expensive endeavor. We'd need more instruments, drill planning, musical arrangement, color guard instructors, and choreography. A lot goes into a band show. That's twice as much cash that no one has at the moment.

Before delving further into the Pride's importance, I want to deal with this plan a little bit. It has been a couple months since the original plan, and a lot has been spoken of and passed around since then about this and that, so I definitely want to address some of the things I never thought of before along with things that other people have said in favor of the plan.

To most people, the school marching band is not a big deal. In fact, Broken Arrow takes its Pride for granted. To people who were a part of it, it's family. I saw this dissolution as soon as I read the configuration proposal, and I said something. In the beginning of all of this, I was criticized for putting the band ahead of academic success and progress. They said that the town has enough talent to make a great marching band, but the directors indicated that whatever that is won't be the Pride because their mentality is that it should be an opportunity for all students equally and a two school system can't promise that. So someone telling me there will be another band as good is like telling a grieving parent that they can have more children.

This means that a split that has as parts of its intent to provide more opportunities will take away the opportunity that hundreds of band students look forward to every year. Is that a sacrifice we want to make? Is it one we have to make? Beyond that, a large campus offers infinitely more opportunities than a smaller one because more students mean more ideas which translate into more niche areas. So which opportunities have floated to the surface that people really want? Sports. People want their kid to play on a sports team and there are only limited numbers of people who can. Welcome to life. I heard the NFL just did their draft. Thousands desired to have a spot and only a couple hundred were selected. So many people want to play though. Should we split the NFL? If you ask a band student who missed out on All-State because there are limited spots, they'll tell you to get good. Practice your butt off and go for again next year. It's the way life works. Deal with it now.

Some point to school size, but size is a relative thing and big or small is a matter of opinion and perspective. Broken Arrow doesn't have the largest high school in the nation or even our region. Two of our nearest neighbors and competitors are Union and Jenks, both of whom have 10-12 graders in their high school. BA has 3500. Union does too. Jenks was at 3300. This doesn't mean we're big. It means we're comparable.

"But students feel isolated or invisible in a school this size." Students have to make themselves visible. They have to want to do something. They have to step out and decide to do something. No teacher can force a student to get involved, but there is something at that high school for literally everyone if they want to find it. I am a major introvert and I found more than one thing to do while I was there and the population was pushing 2,000 with just juniors and seniors.

"But you don't know everyone's names because we're so big. Don't even know everyone is every class." You know what? I knew the names of the people around me in my classes, not everyone. And this is another example of life. I work in an office with about 200 people. I don't know everyone's name. I know the ones around me and that's about it.

"But the gym is not big enough for pep rallies and other gatherings." Well, the Gym (formerly known as building G) wasn't built for the current population, but there are other ways to manage large populations for things like this. We have the technology to stream it for example to the student union and other places. Some students actually don't care and don't want to go. Why make them?

"What about overcrowding at that high school?" Perspective. My wife and I both attended BAHS and my oldest is there now. We knew how big it was, but it never felt that way from the inside. We had our place. How about putting 9th graders with seniors? My middle child is in 9th grade and while she wouldn't be bothered, she prefers being with her own age group and likes the freshman academy for that reason. Also for that reason, a transition to a 10th-grade academy followed by yet another to the senior high doesn't bother her at all. Maybe we should have asked the kids what they think instead of adults who can't relate and only think we know best.

"But the high school is old and needs work." So is the freshman academy. The former SIHS is actually older than the high school. Both campuses are aging, and the district is working on them. It takes time. Some have given knocked my comment about the high school being a Rolls Royce and point to its many issues. My original thought process in that analogy was noting that comparing the Freshman Academy to the High School was like comparing a three-door hatchback to a Rolls Royce. I was simply saying that the high school was a bigger, better campus and putting high schoolers at the freshman academy would be cheating them out of opportunities.

Then when the frustration really kicks in, people say it should be about academics. You can't let the Pride be more important that academics. Let's talk about academics. First, you can get academics anywhere. People homeschool. There are a wealth of private schools in the area. But you didn't homeschool or put you kids in one of those other places. No, you have them at our high school. Why? Can't afford the other options is a popular choice, but a reason we wanted our kids to be in this school was for the opportunities it afforded. To be very specific, we wanted them to have the chance to be in the Pride. We didn't want Union or anywhere in Tulsa. We wanted Broken Arrow. We went there. We liked it. Besides, academics don't happen out on the campus in the populace. They happen in the classroom. I heard that Broken Arrow's student-teacher ratio was 20:1. Yes, some are higher and some are lower, but that's the curse of averages. That ratio means the academics can happen just fine because those occur between students and teachers. Additionally, both the high school and freshman academy have unused space because we have no teachers to fill the rooms. A split won't change that.

That actually can't be solved locally but at the state level where our current government apparently cares more about their agendas than education but that's another topic entirely. Due to the Oklahoma's inability to manage our money, the student-teacher ratio is going up even down to grade levels where there is classroom space available, but the district can't afford the teachers to fill them.

If Broken Arrow was going to entertain a split, it should have been done years ago before we oriented everything to befit a large scale high school. It's not just the band that would suffer in a split. We have dozens of unique academic opportunities that can only exist in a school with a large population. In our high school, find classes with only one instance or with a single teacher. Classes like that can't survive a split because they require a certain level of interest. Look for clubs that you don't find on every campus. Unusual ones with a low population count. Those also wouldn't survive.

So, in the case of our district, the plan on the table takes two overcrowded campuses and shuffles the students around which gives you ... two overcrowded campuses. The most basic solution is more classrooms and teachers, and I mean more than 10 at each campus. More is under construction now, but until you can alleviate the current overcrowding at each campus, moving students around won't help and certainly is not worth the sacrifice of the Pride.

So let's go back to the Pride. Does the Pride deserve to be considered in a decision that would result in its destruction? Yes. That organization has done more for our community than any of us ever will. The band puts nearly 400 students on the field which is more than any other group. It has the largest parent volunteer organization on campus as well. You may or may not know that schools get a grade for the number of parent volunteer hours logged. The Pride parents log enough hours for the school to get an A rating by themselves. Like the concessions at any high school event? Look who's running it. It's the Pride parents who volunteer their time to serve you concessions at your football and soccer games at the high school and freshman academy stadiums. Behind the scenes of those 400-ish students is a cast of thousands running the show. All out of love for the kids and the program. Does something that important to thousands of people deserve consideration?

Words swirl around in my head when it comes to all of this. Besides progress and sacrifice, I also get legacy and tradition. The band was founded in 1929 and the Pride label was first used in the 70's, I believe. So we've had this high school band for 90 years. To call it a tradition is almost too small a word. It is weaved into the town's very fabric and history, and while I know many things go away over the years in the name of progress, we don't want to lose traditions for the sake of someone's misplaced desire to leave a legacy. If this is passed, the legacy of our board will be that they ended the Pride of Broken Arrow. They consciously voted on a plan knowing the consequence that hundreds of students would lose a life experience that has positively impacted our town and its children for decades.

Dissolving the Pride would be like disowning Kristen Chenoweth, and the Pride is actually more famous. It's not just national. It's international in its fame. Every year tens of thousands of people sit in stadiums, hear the name of Broken Arrow, and they wait to leave the stadium because they know they're going to see something amazing. A speaker at the recent Pride banquet, who was never a member and yet still has Pride gear, was wearing a polo with the Pride logo in places like Columbia and Japan, and he met people who knew us. A guy I work with from Indianapolis told me with considerable pride that his local high school got one of our band directors: Mr. Kaflek. They wanted him because he taught at Broken Arrow. They wanted a piece of the Pride to teach them.

The Pride has hosted a drum Corp competition for several summers now that has brought thousands of people into our town as either part of those ensembles or as spectators who follow them. The Pride has also hosted Oklahoma Bandmaster Association state championships which brings thousands to our town from across the state to watch. The Pride has won this for more than 10 years straight. On the most watched parade in the world this year, the name of Broken Arrow was seen by millions of people because of the Pride. Watch What Happens at football games before and after halftime. People come to watch the band, and then they leave. Seats clear up all over the stadium after halftime. So people pay to go to football games, watch the band, and reveal that's what they came for, not to watch football. How many towns in Oklahoma can boast that some people prefer to watch the local band than the football team? The pride of Broken Arrow is literally one of the best things about Broken Arrow, and you want to end it. Some little town in Oklahoma is recognized across the world because of its marching band. And they want to end it.

Like I said, this is not some apocalyptic doomsday prediction. The directors have already told the students that this would happen if the school splits.

From a first-hand perspective on the impact here, I was in the Pride back in 1991-92 when it was required and we didn't win everything. But we went to Arizona for the Fiesta Bowl parade and marched in the Inauguration parade for Bill Clinton. My sister was in D.C. again for Bush's second inauguration. How many of you did that? The Pride is a unique opportunity for our children that will never happen again in their lives. Ever. The reaction of my 6th grader when informed that by the time she reaches 9th grade, there may not be a pride to try out for? Tears. She has been wanting that since she saw the pride perform as a 4th grader. For almost 3 years, it has been in her plans to tryout at the end of 8th grade, and they want to end it. She cried. We consoled her with the idea that it was just a preliminary recommendation and pray that it will never pass. How many more children like her are out there who want more than anything to be a part of that group. It's a major opportunity that will be gone. How many dreams will be shattered? Do they matter?

So does something need to be done? Sure. But we don't need to split the campus. We don't need multiple high schools. There are a wealth of other problems that can also create but I've talked long enough. What we really need is better management of what we have. If we can't manage this, how are we supposes to handle changing things around? There are bigger high schools in the nation with 4, 5, and even 8,000 students in a physical location. Rather than going right to a split, why not investigate their solutions with a big campus? Carmel, IN is a nationally recognized school for its academics and such and it has the Freshman on campus too, giving them 5,000 students. Universities are massive with tens of thousands of students and they manage as well.

Broken Arrow has something amazing right now. We should never want to lose it now or in the future. "But we're growing" people say. According to the current numbers, we have a peak coming with a class of 1500, but looking over all the numbers, it is unique. They're also 2nd graders. The numbers behind it didn't grow. Could we get bigger? Yes. Do I have a suggestion? Well, we need to ensure we manage our funding correctly and ensure what was promised is done. It's 2017 and according to the schedule, our STEM classrooms for the high school were funded last year. They've decided to hold off on those for now. Yeah, we need more classrooms and they won't build them. The high school campus was built for juniors and seniors and a full campus was pushed to capacity by haphazardly adding in the sophomores. I thought that was a bad idea at the time as well.

To alleviate the stress, rather than a third high school, which was proposed, building a sophomore academy was a very popular notion. This would give the current campus plenty of growth room for the future since we've established how many students it can hold. I would be for reallocating the bond money to make that happen.

Even beyond that and beyond the proposal that was slowed down for the moment, and that we hope will not resurface, the community does not realize the good the Pride does for it. They don't realize that people have come here just to be part of that. Alumni stay here so their kids can be a part of it. People who aren't part of the band know it. The guy in charge of the Rose Parade sent a video message for the banquet looking forward to seeing the Pride again, perhaps, in four years. Little does he know that the current proposal means there won't be a Pride to go in four years. The speaker at the banquet looked forward to seeing the progress of our percussion ensembles in the WGI tournaments in ten years. In ten years, we may not be going. If we told someone outside of our band that our school board was considering something to end the Pride, they would think we lost our minds.

Broken Arrow current has one identity. We are Tigers. Businesses support the singularity of the teams and clubs they like because it is easy. There is only one to support. Splitting us would split the town. We would have to pick a side. Businesses would too. Bond issues would forever have to appeal to both sides or it won't pass. That's what the facilitator we brought in said to someone after one of the meetings. He thought the split was a terrible idea. He's also from a district with a 4000+ population high school.

We need progress, but we need the right kind of progress. The proposal we had was wrong for us in many ways, and we hope to never see it again. There is some suggestion in the wording from the district that we might get it back with some extra explanation showing that they did not listen to us and did what they wanted. We want something that will be beneficial to the most students, not ruin the town, and solve our underlying problem.

An Attempt to Inform On A Reply

So, my post on the Broken Arrow school split was seen by a lot of people, and obviously, not everyone agreed. Interestingly, however, a lot of feedback has resulted from people whose response was uninformed and unresearched. I intended to do a longer post, but this one came through Facebook, and I thought I'd address it.

"George. Unfortunately what you think and the politics that play out.  Broken Arrow needs at least 2 high schools and possibly 3.  I personally among others within the school system tend to agree.  Split the schools up including Pride.  The system is TOO large and needs to be split up so it will give the others fair share of making the Pride.  Two Pride in Broken Arrow is not a BAD thing.  Let's face it, Broken Arrow is too BIG for one High School.  I'm not the only one that feels this way!!

Never have been a fan of yours even when you worked at US Cellular.  To me you were nothing but a trouble maker and I still see this as true.  You sir are NOT a team player.  You want to create havoc among thE TEAM and others that I know tend to agree.  I personally hope that BA is split up in ALL areas including PRIDE."

Part of me gets that this is a bit personal. I am, shall we say, in with a large group of people who do not want to see the schools split. Hence, I am standing with my "team" and assisting them. I admit to being a bit of a troublemaker, but in this case, I have a cause that I am standing up for, and I believe this is the right way to go.

Are there a fair number of people for the split? Oh yes. Plenty. The problem is that many of those opinions ring similar to this one. It isn't a bad thing. More bands are good. The high school is too big. The city can support more than one. In principle, these opinions are not wrong, but we also have to consider the local environment and what we've built so far.

Two Prides? No. It was established right from the start that the Pride as we know it would end. Due to OSSAA regulations, each school would need its own competitive marching band and due to the dilution of talent and smaller base to draw from, the optional extracurricular Pride would need to return to the required presence for all band students. Not everyone wants to be in marching band and enjoy the option. Additionally, they indicated that since it would be required, they would have trouble asking for the presently high fees associated with being in Pride. A reduction in cost is a reduction in everything, and some of the national competitions or traveling they do now would be cut down considerably. When it was required in my time, OBA was pretty much the end of our season with a "big trip" every other year.

The system is too large? That is a matter of perspective. We're actually comparable to Union and Jenks in our high school size. And when it comes to Broken Arrow's size, that matters less than the number of students at the campus. We hurt ourselves considerably when we added in the sophomores to the population and made a large campus overwhelming. We have also established, however, how many students it can hold, so pulling those sophomores back out would leave plenty of growth room.

And there's that "fair share" argument. By having more of the same thing, somehow that gives more students more opportunities. Knowing that the Pride as it is with all of its present opportunities will be gone, that will actually be one less thing available to the students. We also know that there are many, many activities possible at a large high school that a smaller one cannot support, both extracurricular and academic. We have specialty classes for students that help them learn in their desired future fields. One of our favorites to mention is an AP Physics 2 class that has 8 students. It used to have 12 before 4 dropped at semester. It's that hard. That class would not survive a split because it wouldn't have enough people. There is also only one AP Physics teacher. Would the class be limited to only one campus? Would only half the district get AP Physics? Would they have to hire a second special teacher for that with the money we don't have for that purpose? A split would be a really, really expensive endeavor which is bad in the current economic climate for schools.

I am formulating a much larger post addressing a lot of the pro-split opinions I've heard in the past couple of months. This thing isn't dead yet, but I do hope some serious discussion is going to to make the best choice for OUR district. Large high schools work, and they work well. They're all over the country in populations larger than ours, so there's plenty of precedents.

About Voting

Elections are a thing in the United States and in many other places in the world, but it seems that when voting comes around, there is a minor misconception people get when doubling down to make that decision. Major parties warn you not to "throw away your vote" or in the case of the last presidential election "cast a protest vote." Neither of these is actually possible.

When one votes for something, the intention is that they engage in a conscious decision to put forth their voice to say which of the available choices they think are best. There is, in fact, no way for anyone to throw away their vote (or make a protest vote). Any vote put forth in good faith to make a decision in one's own best interest is a valid decision...whether that decision turns out to be the winning one or not.

My impression of some people is that when they enter into a voting situation, they get caught up in a game mentality. In the musical, Hamilton, some secondary characters are pondering who to vote for in the election of 1800: Adams, Jefferson, or Burr. When Adams is considered, the comment is made "He's gonna lose, that's just defeatist." This comment is right in line ith the idea that voting for someone who can't win is throwing your vote away. The idea of an election or vote of any kind is to determine the desires of the people, not for the people to play a game to guess who is going to win. Sometimes, you'll even hear about those who guessed wrong later. They'll say they voted wrong because their angle lost.

That's not why you vote. There is no prize for picking the winner. Unless you put money on it, but the legality of that is questionable in some areas.

The point of this is that when you vote, you are supposed to go in with the mindset to always make the outcome better, and even if that entails putting your voice behind something you think may lose, that's fine. If you believed in it, you did the right thing.

If everyone in the country stopped guessing the winner and started voting their heart, maybe we'd start making some positive progress.

The State Of Education Dictates The State Of Everything

I'm just a guy living out here in Broken Arrow with very little knowledge of what goes on in the capital. I don't know the in and outs and nitty-gritty of the numbers or how they come to be so, but at the same time, this is something I trusted you to do. What I have learned is that you suck at it. I've also learned that with the cuts made to the budget in education along with how it has been managed to date even without this crisis, you also have no idea how things work in the real world of people, schools and businesses. You offer breaks to businesses while breaking schools, and that's a risky endeavor for the future of the entire state. You've been putting education in second place for years and driving it to the bottom of the nation, and it's starting to impact your budget. Why are you short on money? Here's the problem when it comes to the construction of an average life versus the mess you've made.

First, we have the problem of teacher pay. Why start there? Because people decide where they work based on a number of factors, but pay is a big part of it. If a teacher can afford to move only a few hours down the road, they can substantially increase their pay. The teachers who can make the move do so. Those that have family or other obligations, a spouse with a better paying job allowing them to support their "teaching habit" stay. Oklahoma is suffering from overcrowding in schools not because of a shortage of classrooms, but a shortage of teachers. It has gotten so bad that we're accepting people who want to help without degrees in teaching and giving them "emergency certifications."

Great schools start with great teachers. How many are you driving to neighboring states or out of the profession entirely by disrepecting their right to a professional wage? Yeah, not a living wage; a professional wage. Teachers need at least a bachelor's degree and they get paid as much as someone on the phone doing customer service. Most professions offer big incentives to people who get Master's or Doctoral degrees, but not education. Most teachers don't bother because it would cost more to get that degree than they could justify it in an insultingly tiny pay increase.

Next, with this little debacle of a lack of money, we are cutting all kinds of stuff to make up for it. Did you cut anything? Have you stopped tkaing your children to activities or extra things? Well, the schools have had to. Some are consolidating together creating more kids in less classrooms, some are cutting programs that aren't even extracurricular, but used as part of the curriculum. The Accelerated Reader program is threatened, and this was something in place to help children know which books are on their level or greater and incentivize them to read more. Some schools are talking about 4 day weeks to save on utilties. Sure, they'll rework the hours to make up the time, but it still translates to less class time. Bus routes are being cut meaning more kids will have more trouble getting to school.

The schools will suffer immesaureably as a result of your inability to take care of them. Guess what comes next? Schools affect many facets of our lives. I recently commented in my own district that people revolve their lives around school districts and where they want their kids to go. Houses are selected based on districts and target schools. Good schools raise property values. Undesirable schools lower them. If you send all of our schols right into the toilet, what's going to happen to the state? People who are not anchored will leave or never come.

This would have a domino effect on businesses you so desperately want to be located in Oklahoma. What if industries recognize that our schools are not supported by our legislature and are suffering? They won't want to come here because they know their employees would not want to come here. By making the schools second rate on your agenda, you are not only hurting our children, you are potentially making the entire state suffer. It may be a doomsday prediction, but if people plan their lives around schools, and businesses plan their future around people, then eventually, your careless neglect of our schools will send the whole state into ruin.

Everything is connected. Poor teacher pay leads to higher classroom ratios which leads to a decline in education quality. Cuts in education funding lead to cuts in school programs and even basic services which leads to further declines in educaiton quality. Poor quality of education leads businesses to reconsider their desire to come to Oklahoma since their employees would want a better education for their children. Decline of industry in Oklahoma means decline in revenues which leads back around to further declines in education.

Schools are the foundation of just about everything we have, not just in the education of our next generation, but in enticing more revenue to come into our state and keeping what we have. If you make education a priority, you will make everything else better. If you don't care, you are elected officials, and we'll keep voting you out until we find someone who does. To any voters reading this, until this problem is solved, we need to start reminding our government who actually has the power of change and start removing them. New blood is clearly required to fix this.

I considered sending this via email, but email is so easy to ignore and delete. Besides, this is not just for those who hold office. We're all in power because in a democratic republic, the people are the voice. Not special interest groups. Not those greasing palms. Not personal agendas or desired legacies. Those of us out here who are suffering and watching our children suffer because you can get your act together and do the job you were elected to do.

It's said you make time for what it important to and the same goes for money. You always prioritize money in the most important things first. You've shown that you find education unimportant.

You may have to put pet projects on hold. You may have to cut something you really wanted. You might have to not give tax breaks and bonuses to certain businesses or industries. You might actually piss some people off, but to redirect money to education is the right thing to do and it will benefit everyone in the long run. ANY cuts to education aren't worth it, and more money needs to be funneled into it. However you screwed up the lottery needs to be put right. If you don't know what to do, start reviewing states sitting at the top of the list of the best schools or at least those doing better than we are. They did something right. Maybe you can emulate them. There are lots of examples. At least 46 or 47 based on the most recent numbers I've found.

We're tired of our schools being at the bottom of the list of quality. We're tired of our teachers being at the bottom of the list in pay. We're doing the best we can with what you give us to work with, but we need you to care. We need you to realize that this needs to be a priority. Not SAY it is a priority and then continue business as usual. Do it.

How will we know when you've done it? When we start moving up the lists. We've been at the bottom for awhile, so clearly this isn't a priority. nothing has convinced you that we are serious. Teacher marches don't convince you. People have called and emailed, and that's not enough. Now look what you've done. A budget shortage. It is starting already. Is that enough? You can't cut education. You've been ruining it for years which is just making everything worse. Keep education at the top of your list of things that need to keep going up and cut other stuff. Once you've fixed education and the money starts rolling in again, you can put the other stuff back.

If education comes first, everything else will follow. If education is last, everything else will suffer.

A Letter of Thanks to The Broken Arrow Board of Education

Greetings Board of Education,

I want to personally thank you for the worst recommendation in the history of Broken Arrow for reorienting our school district, destroying our economy, and breaking up our town. I know the recommendation came from a Steering Committee and all that, but I'm not so blind to not know that there was not at least a finger or two in it. I also know that the deciding factor comes down to three out of five of you making the decision to move forward or not.

This preliminary recommendation, whether it passes or not, has had a profound effect on this town and its people. It has revealed to us that we have been blind, and we don't want to break up. You have, thus far, enjoyed a relatively quiet existence winning canceled, unopposed elections, but this recommendation has changed everything. You see, it turns out threatening to break up Broken Arrow caused it to get all riled up. Turns out those of us on 51st and those of us on 131st actually still like being neighbors and want to keep doing high school together. Like the Japanese dropping bombs on Pearl Harbor, you have awakened a sleeping giant, and this giant is sorry he's been asleep for so long.

Now, regardless of how you vote and regardless of how this proposal moves forward, what you do is now being watched. We are suddenly very aware of our local government and who is making the decisions for us. We are looking at the bios for every one of you and eagerly awaiting your vote on this issue so we can find out if you deserve to remain where you are or if we need to find someone else to represent us. We will find out where you stand on what matters to us which will tell us how you feel about our community and schools. We will know if you agree with us or not, and if you fail to do as we wish, we will find someone to run against you and vote you out.

You have helped us to realize and remember that we want our community unified more than anything. We've been teaching this across the district for years. Every student is a tiger. We are one school, one faculty, one spirit, one pride, one team, one voice, one tradition, and one community, and you will not take that away from us. If you are not part of our ONE Broken Arrow, then you need to be somewhere else.

This is not a threat, of course. Here is the United States of America, we call it democracy in action. You are only where you are because we have allowed you to be there, however blindly it may have been.

So as you settle into your comfortable chairs to cast your votes on this decision and all that come in the future, be aware that we will know and talk about what you do. And if we don't like it, we will plan to remove you. God bless America.

I am so glad this recommendation came out and forced us to look at our local government and start to take control again. Good job.

BA Gets Punked By School System Recommendation ... We Hope

On March 21, Broken Arrow Public Schools' High School Configuration Study Steering Committee (try saying that five times fast) somehow reached a consensus regarding a recommendation about how to rework the Broken Arrow High School and its population growth. The article (which you can read in its entirety here: BAPS Preliminary Recommendation Article) goes on about two years worth of research and data to reach their recommendation, and to the horror of the community revealed a plan that is the most divisive, dangerous, and economically destructive plan I have ever seen in my life. After I thought, "How are they going to pay for all of that?", I eventually came down to the conclusion that this has to be a joke.

It has to be. There are eighteen people on the steering committee consisting of all ages from high school students to retirees and even the current BAHS principal. How did these people put this plan together and not realize the disastrous implications of it? No one along the way considered any of the ways this could go horribly wrong? Nobody? It's got to be someone's pet project. Got to be. There's just no other way this is real. Maybe I misinterpreted it. Maybe they left out some key words that would change it all. Or maybe it is what it says it is.

Walk with me through the ways this plan can take Broken Arrow from a thriving suburb with an enviable school system to complete ruin. Note that this is my impression of this plan, but I also think that if you come up with something that has even a chance of going this badly, you gotta come up with something else.

And just so you know, I'm a Broken Arrow native. I grew up here. I went to Northeast Elementary (now Rhodes), Sequoyah Middle, North Intermediate, and graduated from Broken Arrow High School. I remember the Sound and Spirit of Broken Arrow marching bands and their rivalry as was a member of the Broken Arrow Pride. I now live in Broken Arrow with my wife and three children who are 6th, 9th, and 12th graders. Moving on...

So first, let's deal with the core of the recommendation. They want to split the current high school campus by leveraging the current Freshman Academy as a second high school. Their idea is to have a max population at the original campus of up to 4,350 students and a population of the Freshman campus of up to 1,950 students. Yeah, that's a lot. There's also an "Options Academy" that isn't thoroughly explained, but it's supposed to have 650 students. This building is currently the "Alternative Academy." I'll let you guess what it's for. Eventually, they plan on adding STEM classes or something and then eventually, eventually add a third high school if the community votes in a $200 million bond in 2027. The number split by that time will be 3250 at campus 1, 2250 at campus 2, and 3250 at campus 3. They refer to these as "comprehensive 9-12 grade high schools."

Here's the problem. Our current high school is what you might call a Rolls Royce of high schools. It is the largest one in the state of Oklahoma and has all kinds of amenities for students to use. The sheer size of it grants programs of unparalleled specialization because you have that many different interests to fuel them. My own child is in a class of eight people because of it specialization. It has twelve but four dropped at semester. You only get that in a student body of this size on a campus of this magnitude.

The Freshman Academy is ... well, not that. Compared to the high school, it's a ... well, 3 door hatchback. One with an engine so small that you can't put an air conditioner on it without burning out the engine and it only comes with a manual 5-speed transmission. No automatic. Engine too small. One of the "great things" about splitting the high school was supposed to be increased opportunities for more students. The theory here is that when you have two schools, you have, say, two football teams and now, more kids can make the teams. Well, the Freshman Academy doesn't have the facilities to support a football team, really. It barely has a stadium. Additionally, when you split the population like that, you dilute the talent base. You have two teams, sure, but they're only half as good. You also lose that specialization I mentioned. all those neat classes you can have with a massive student body? You can't do those in a smaller school because two or three students don't make a class. They won't be offered.

Let us not forget, though, that while this smaller school is attempting to validate itself, the original one is still sitting out there in all its luxurious glory. That means that in this town, you'd have the "good" school and the "bad" school ... well, it isn't bad so much as the one that's not as good as the good one. Kids will pick up on this and hate that they're not going to the high school they were promised in the beginning. They're going to graduate from BAPS, and one of their memories will be that they didn't get to go to the good school. Teenagers are grumpy about school anyway, and we want to encourage this? Well, I suppose that will also decrease the population. Parents will also pick up on this which leads to my next point.

Schools fuel where people live. When looking for a house, realtors always put down which school district the house is in. People want to live where their kids will go to a particular school. To date, living in Broken Arrow Schools meant that you would attend the fabulous Broken Arrow High School and get all that that entails. In the future, realtors will need to notate which BAHS the kid would attend. The good one up north or the other one down south. Given the choice between the Rolls and the hatchback, which would you pick? The Rolls comes with its own driver, by the way...

Yup, you picked the Rolls. Who would live in the zone with the other school? The people who are already there, of course. You know, there is already talk of leaving the district or moving up north by people on the south side if this goes through? Already. And this is "just the preliminary recommendation." Fast forward that a few years, and what do you have? A wasteland of empty houses in south Broken Arrow. The former Indian Springs neighborhood where houses went for hundreds of thousands of dollars now can't sell a single one because the people who can afford those houses can also afford the ones closer to the good school. Businesses dry up and close. I know a business owner who considered opening a restaurant in South BA. He's now waiting to see what happens with this school thing cause he's not willing to build anything if it passes. He knows what's coming. Another friend advised his mother to sell out of her house quickly if it goes through. You know, before the market drops and you lose your equity.

Will this happen? Who knows, but it's not only pretty dark but fairly plausible since people are already talking about doing things that would fuel this scenario. We're pretty scared about it on this end which is why I think this plan has got to be a joke. How could a group of people be so blind to not consider the economic repercussions of a plan that would affect their entire city? This whole thing is fueled by population growth. I don't know. Maybe the plan is to stifle the growth so they don't need that third high school. This certainly looks like an effective way to do it. I really don't know how they could have missed it. I went from plan synopsis to Armageddon in only a few paragraphs. Like I said in the beginning, we're being punked here.

You may note that I listed a bunch of problem adjectives above. Could there be more wrong with this beyond economic ruin? Oh yes. This thing has yet more problems beyond just driving our town to bankruptcy. Another reason this seriously must be a joke.

How about the core problem in above that leads us to this ruin? Unequal schools. This is not how Broken Arrow Public Schools makes such a change. Historically, when the district needs to split a school (at the elementary or middle school levels), it always builds a new school that is superior to the old one. They've always done this. Highland Park and Oneta Ridge are a couple of the newest, I believe, and they are amazing. At least from the outside. I've never been inside, but the exterior looks great. When I see the Freshman Academy, I see South Intermediate High School with a different name. The inside hasn't changed much, I hear, in thirty years. Of course, there have been changes, but it's mostly the same. That's not the way we do things around here. You see, Broken Arrow people are spoiled, demanding, friendly, and unified. We want things a certain way, and the plan doesn't deliver that in the way they've always done it.

Broken Arrow has always resisted a high school split. Always. They were discussing this when I was at the high school in the 90s. We were getting bigger, but the community did not want their school split up. Why? A huge reason is community unity. We are the Broken Arrow Tigers. The whole town is. Every middle school has the Tiger as its mascot. Everyone from all over our city works together for the students because every single person knows that every child in our city, regardless of where they're going to elementary or middle school, will end up together in a single community at the high school. When I was in school, we had a rivalry between North and South Intermediate, but at the end of a band competition when North and South took 1st and 2nd, someone from South came up to me and randomly gave me a hug. She said, "I don't know who you are, man, but I'll see you in the Pride." In that moment, the rivalry melted away, and we were one city. One team. One band. One people. We want to remain one city, and a high school split threatens that one thing we hold most dear. Our unity. We love that we're one. Love it. That aspect is why someone people came here. They don't like towns that are split over their school structure. I love that when I talk about Broken Arrow, I don't have to qualify anything. Broken Arrow is one city. Why would we do something to destroy that unity?

It goes further than that. I mentioned the Pride in my last paragraph. The Pride of Broken Arrow is one of Broken Arrow's most nationally known items after Kristen Chenoweth. The Pride has a member who came to Broken Arrow from Indiana because he wanted to be part of it after seeing them on a national competitive stage. The Pride's shows are unlike any marching band show you've ever seen. Seriously, look them up on YouTube. They have won the National Marching Band Championships with Bands of America three times, but their shows are amazing every time. A bitter school rivalry dissolved with the words, "I don't know who you are, man, but I'll see you in the Pride." People who aren't part of it don't understand that being in the Pride was not about winning. We didn't win OBA my senior year, but it was still amazing. I met my wife in the Pride, so it is part of my life's fabric. The idea that the school planners would throw this and so many other programs away hurts. The Pride isn't the only nationally awarded program in the high school. As we've been discussing this, the list just kept growing from other fine arts programs like Show Choir to Cheerleading to Debate. Broken Arrow is on the map of the world because they are awesome and this awesomeness comes from our unity. Together we can change the world as long as we remain together. Why oh why would you want to ruin that?

I love this town, and I love these schools. I don't think the planning committee knows what they are dealing with even though they have the current principal and a former director of the Pride on it. These elements alone make me think this plan is someone else's. Not a recommendation of the committee so much as the brain child of someone who doesn't understand Broken Arrow or what the high school structure means to us.

So what can we do? There is no denying that the growth of the student population is a legitimate problem that needs a solution. Well, let me share what I initially thought this proposal was giving us. You see, I went in with a positive mindset and real into it what I thought it must be saying before I realized none of these words were in the article.

One proposal for fixing the growth was an Academy or University model. This means that regardless of where you went to a high school campus in Broken Arrow, that campus was part of Broken Arrow High School. All the opportunities and classes from every campus were available to you, as a student. You simply might have to travel to a different campus to take advantage of it. The core of everything would still be at the original campus while satellite campuses primarily housed core and common classes. The multiple locations were their biggest advantage. For instance, there are classes for students at Tulsa Technical College which is only a few miles from the Freshman Academy, but quite a distance from the Senior High. It would be advantageous for a Tech student to attend classes at Tulsa Tech and then only have a few miles to their closest campus for the remainder of their day, even if they have a sports practice of some kind at the main campus later. You see, when I first read the proposal, that is what went through my head because that fits Broken Arrow. We keep our unity, but the student body gets dispersed to convenient locations around town more conducive to their homes. It's a simple solution where everyone wins. No businesses shut down. People don't move away. You end up at the campus that is best for your path while losing none of the grand opportunities the size gives you, and Broken Arrow, as a city, keeps its unity. We continue to support one high school and one set of programs. Third school building? No problem. More student dispersal and growth is supported while maintaining everything we have now. It even follows their timeline.

What they have put before us can be read two ways. One way gives us an answer to a problem in the best way possible to allow unlimited growth while maintaining our city's unity and high school opportunities. The other divides us and brings us to economic ruin. If it's the former, I fully support it. If it is the latter. Seriously, we're being punked.

Addendum 3/29/2017: I posted a link to this blog post on the Broken Arrow Public Schools Facebook page as a comment to a recent post about this topic. They deleted it. So their definition of an "open discussion" only involves opinions they like? Suspicious...

Unusual Words

Being a writer, I like a wide variety of words, and over the years, I've amassed quite a few words that have some specific meanings that English doesn't have a word for. Some of these I've pulled from other languages, some were swiped from a couple of articles on Cracked.com about words, but I figured I'd share them all right here today.


grevaldor (noun) - (pronounced grev-ALL-door) a parent who has experienced the death of a child. A person who has lost a child. Based on the Old French grever which is the root word for grieve and Old English ealdor for parent.


prepone (verb) - to rescheduled something to occur prior to its previously scheduled time. The opposite of postpone.


stinn (noun) - a person who is standing in a stationary position blocking whatever it is you need to do for no discernable reason. This most often applies to two people talking in front of a sink or water cooler without actually using those items. Sentences: "I needed to refill my water, but I couldn't make the stinn move." "The stinns were blind to the world talking football in front of the restroom door, so I figured I'd just go upstairs."


prax (noun) - Anyone trying to sneak more than the posted maximum allowed items in an express lane at a grocery store. "It clearly says 10 items or less, and that prax has 15."
prax (verb) - the act of taking more than the posted maximum allowed item in an express lane at a grocery store. "You'll never be able to prax with that many items." Future sign at an express lane: "No Praxing"


drevend (noun) - an item you want to deal with or accomplish at some point, but probably never will. Usually part of a list of other, similar items. "He ranked reading the Bible with the other drevends in his life." "As they searched through his effects, one drevend after another revealed itself." "The 1001 movies you must watch before you die is more of a list of drevends than something anyone might actually do."


neech (noun) - An inevitable, obvious, and often childish, comeback or notion (that may or may not be clever) that someone (who clearly thinks they are clever) felt they had to say eventually about a subject. "I had to concede to the neech that yes, Queen of Hearts does sound like Queen of Farts." "Yes, I have heard the neech that the Retardis was the slower second version of the Tardis."


requiz (verb) - 1. to ask the same question over and over again. 2. to ask an incessant number of questions past the point of logical understanding of the subject. requizzer (noun) someone who requizzes. "The new person has requizzed me so many times, I'm not sure they'll understand." "How many times can we requiz this subject?" "I try to steer clear of requizzers. Too much time lost."


probochondriac (noun) - someone who has the same problem over and over again. "This probochondriac has managed to break their PC a dozen times this week."


Slacosphere (noun) -  1. a region consisting of a cluster of non-productive people, aka slackers. "Henderson works up on the 17th floor in the slacosphere with the rest of those boneheads." 2. a room designed for the sole purpose of avoiding productivity. "Have a seat on the comfy couch and check out my new 84" flatscreen, the centerpiece of my slacosphere."


rollaction (noun), rollact (verb) - the literal eye roll or reaction your wife gives when you do those weird little things she loves about you that she rolls her eyes at every time. "Tell that joke she's heard before? She rollacts as expected."




backashan - a beautiful girl, as long as she is viewed from behind. Similar to butterface, as in everything about her its hot but her face. Etymology: from Japanese Bakku-Shan

stairway comeback - when you think if the perfect verbal comeback...much too late - Etymology: Espirit d'escalier (French)

Lapinye - a look between two people that suggests a shared, unspoken desire - Etymology: Mamihlapinatapai (Yaghan)

Backfang - a person with a face badly in need of a fist. As in smug or not knowing when not to say something stupid or embarrassing - Etymology: Backpfeifengesicht (German)

Nunchi - the art of not becoming a backfang (backpfeifengesicht). As in knowing when not to say something to get punched. - Etymology: Nunchi (Korean)

Shlematzle - someone who had nothing but bad luck - Etymology: Shlimazl (Yiddish)

Tatamay & honay (ta-ta-may & hoe-nay) - what you pretend to believe and what you actually believe, respectively. - Etymology: Tatemae & honne (Japanese)

Malareach - when people interrupt you at meal time - Etymology: Sgiomlaireachd (Scottish gaelic)

Tingo - to borrow from a friend until he has nothing left - Etymology: Tingo (Pascuense)

macgyver - to pull a MacGyver. The art of slapping together a solution to a problem at the last minute with no advanced planning and no resources. - Etymology: Desenrascanco (Portuguese)

Shemojam - to eat past the point if being full just because the food tastes good. Lit. I accidentally ate the whole thing - Etymology: Shemomedjamo (Georgian)

sad-weight - excess weight gained from emotional overeating. - Etymology: Kummerspeck (German) Lit. Grief bacon

Kikamore - a teenager or 20 something who has withdrawn from society, often obsessed with TV and video games. - Etymology: Hikikomori (Japanese)

Nomborshule - an answer that is unrelated to the question. ex. to give a nomborshule. - Etymology: Gadrii nombor shulen jongu (Tibetan) Lit. Giving a green answer to a blue question

dorcheck - to go outside to check if an expected visitor has arrived, over and over again. - Etymology: Iktsuarpok (Inuit)

Kail - an ugly miserable woman who yells obscenities at her kids - Etymology: Kaelling (Danish)

snidebow - a building (often little our no value to the proprietor) constructed with the sole purpose of harassing or inconveniencing his neighbor in some way.  - Etymology: Neidbau (German) Lit. Envy building

grammar nazi - a person who believes it is their destiny to stamp out all spelling and punctuation mistakes at the cost of popularity, self-esteem, and mental well-being. Etymology: Pilkunnussija (Finnish) Lit. Comma Fuckers

==

Butterface - A person, usually a girl, who is beautiful everywhere except in the face.

Lie-chiatrist - An unqualifie person who diagnoses themselves with a mental illness that they don't actually have, for the sole purpose of using it as an easy go-to excuse for their irresponsible behavior.

Gasterval - the period between when a relationship starts and when you first openly fart in front of your partner

Bleakfast - the first meal of the day, consisting of cold leftover from the night before

Intelliduh - stupid actions or words by an otherwise intelligent person

slocking - a popular online pastime best known for being cruise control for cool (having something to do with CAPS LOCK)

zeitgaffe - a cultural reference that is sufficiently inaccurate or outdated to demonstrate that the make of the reference is out of touch with, or separate from, the prevailing group

malamorous - Of a villain in a work, being appealing to fans despite being the antagonist of the work, often because of handsome appearance or justifiable motivation

Friendstipation - the inability to poop when somebody you know might hear

Necroliker - someone who likes a post on Facebook about the loss of a loved one.

Xacuate - The process of attempting to rapidly close a web page before it can be seen by someone else.

Gamacho - The undeserved sense of grandeur and arrogance an individual gets at winning a video game, often making the game miserable for other players.

Wikinius - a person who claims to be an expert in a cetain topic when it's clear they've only read the wikipedia entry on it.

Factoidiot (fack-TOID-ee-uht) - 1. a person who (often incorrectly) quotes a movie or TV show they've never seen. 2. A person who repeats a bit of trivia and knows nothing else about the subject.

yammertia - The resistance of a tiresome, one-sided conversation to any change in its state of motion

apostraphy - The phenomenon of losing supporters in an Internet argument due to the inability to express oneself in proper grammar, orthography, and punctuation.

obstacolleague - a co-worker whose inability to work well (or work at all) forces you to neglect your own duties - so you can fix their mess.

Meeternity - 1. An unproductive business meeting that feels as if it will never end. 2. A string of pointless meetings that last all day halting productivity.

Malaproboner - an inappropriate or inopportune erection of the penis

Consterpation - 1. a long, painful conversation in which every word in a struggle to get out. 2. an awkward dialogue characterized by long pauses and uncomfortable silences.

McRibocrite - a person who complains about how disgusting fast food is, but eats it anyway.

Camoufanning - turning on a bathroom fan to muffle pooping noises

Interawktion - a moment wherein you and a person you've just met share an uncomfortable silence because you've shared something overly weird and/or personal

Soapbombing - deliberately steering all conversations towards one particular issue about which you are very outspoken.

cinefalsity - the spontaneous act of lying to someone about seeing a movie or TV show when you know you haven't.

qui-goner - a character who you always knew was going to die, right from the first scene.

Eleventurer - a master of one-upmanship. the person given to articulating the details of his possessions and his accomplishments deemed to be superior to any you might mention: his higer horsepower, more megapixels, better concert seats, longer workout, etc.

Moistery - inexplicable dampness

keyjam - the dirt, grime, and gunk found in between the keys of a keyboard

lactease - to place any size container of milk back in a refrigerator with only a half fluid ounce remaining at the bottom.

viewgling - intentional search of the internet for plot points and spoilers of movies, so you never again have to hear people gasp when you tell them that you haven't seen Godfather II.

greatsgusting - you knew it was disgusting, but you ate it anyway. And it was delicious.

ninjestrians - people dressed in dark clothing walking along unlighted roads at night

sortamatopoeia - a word for something that doesn't make a sound, but if it did, would sound exactly like that word. ex. bling, slink, glisten

======

"Farpotshket" (Yiddish) - Something that was a little bit broken ... until you tried to fix it. Now it's totally screwed.

"Yaourt" (French) - To sing along in nonsensical noises that vaguely resemble the lyrics of a song.

"Attaccabottoni" (Italian) - A person who corners you to tell you long, meaningless stories, usually about his oh-so-miserable life.

"Epibreren" (Dutch) - Pretending that you're doing something super important, while in reality you're being super lazy.

"Soare cu Dinti" (Romanian) - Weather that looks great until you actually step out in it. Specifically, a beautiful sunny but frigid day.

"Utepils" (Norwegian) - That first beer you drink outside when the weather finally turns warm.

"Drachenfutter" (German) - A gift a man gives to his wife to apologize when he's done something stupid (typically staying out way too late).

"Tartle" (Scots) - The momentary consternation you feel when you go to introduce someone and realize that you've forgotten his or her name. Can also function as a verb.