Do adults live via prep athletics?
8/27/2010The media have begun the annual high school football blitz. One must wonder about the extollment of young athletes.
Athletics, football included, sell the belief that school sports teach such marvelous personal characteristics as teamwork, honesty, integrity, and sacrifice. Yet as we read about the foibles of college and professional athletes, we must wonder about the validity of our beliefs. Are we truly accomplishing positives for our youngsters by continuing to provide them with print and video exultation at their impressionable ages?
We use our Friday forecasts to predict what the weather will be for the area's evening football games, as if no other outdoor activities may be planned. We use sports broadcasts to provide the microphone to our players, as if they had already made the big time.
Could such attention also assist the development of our high school dramatists, choral members, band performers, and foreign language club members? I do not recall as much attention to students in such activities.
Is it possible that the exultation of our high school athletes speaks more to adult needs in reliving their imagined youth than to the true needs of our children? One must wonder whether our children might be better off if the microphone was shut off, parents went about their adult responsibilities, and children just played to have fun.
Gerald Bazer
Sylvania
Surgery 1 method for back problems
Your Aug. 23 article “Pushing back on back surgery” correctly pointed out the recent increase in complex spine procedures.
Although surgery for neck and back pain can be very helpful in some situations, the vast majority of acute back pain is resolved without surgery. Physical therapy, chiropractic adjustments, the use of hands to mobilize and stabilize the spine, medications, and injections are a few of the many nonsurgical approaches.
Among the medical doctors who treat spine pain are physical medicine and rehabilitation specialists, also known as physiatrists, who are trained in nonsurgical approaches to acute and chronic pain. They can help the patient navigate through recovery and decide when surgery can be helpful.
Timothy H. Sigman, M.D.
Nantuckett Drive
Walk to school and stay in shape
I attended Raymer Elementary School and graduated from Waite High School in 1954. Both schools are in East Toledo. Everyone who attended Waite walked there, except for students who lived in Point Place (“Parents, police fret as TPS ends bus service for 5,000,” Aug. 21).
I think it would be wonderful if students walked, because a lot of them who are overweight would benefit by getting more exercise and perhaps losing some excess weight.
Ruby Preston Murray
Ogden Avenue
Lack of busing can be dangerous
I'm concerned about the large number of children who will be walking or biking to school this fall and winter.
I find it difficult to imagine how our kids will fare at high-traffic crossings.
Bill Saunders
Ottawa Hills
‘When I was your age, I had to walk'
Who would have thought that when this generation's children grow up and become parents, they will be able to tell their children, “I had to walk to school two miles, in the rain and the snow,” and not be lying?
Wally Igielski
Sylvania
No time for cuts on police force
My annual visit home to Rossford usually includes a trip down the Maumee River on the Sandpiper, listening to Fred Folger speak on the history of Toledo and its bridges, buildings, docks, and railroads.
The docking site for the Sandpiper is downtown, at the corner of Water Street and Jefferson Avenue. My mother and I parked on Water Street and had a lovely boat ride. When we got back, we found that our car had been broken into and that my computer and a purse that included four watches had been stolen.
We called the police and were told response time would be 45 minutes. Toledo friends told us the Toledo Police Department has been cut dramatically. The city might want to rethink that decision.
Toledo, you have a big problem. Now is not the time to cut back on your police force.
Debi Deimling
Arlington, Va.
Is justice served in Hancock case?
Former lawyer Karyn McConnell Hancock steals $389,000, gets out of prison early, and gets to keep the money (“Ex-attorney guilty of theft is freed early,” Aug. 26). Right before I retire, where do I sign up?
Eric Horvath
Martin, Ohio
Collecting refuse is a welcome job
As someone who is out of a job, I read with interest your Aug 18 article “Council at odds over raises; Fact Finder: Refuse drivers should get up to $21 hourly.”
I have no problem with the job the refuse workers do. They do the best they can, considering the way things are.
But I'll make Mayor Mike Bell an offer: I'll do the job for what they make now, including the benefits. No raise needed. I'd be happy to have a job.
No disrespect intended toward the refuse collectors. Thousands of people just wish they had a job.
T. Yeager
Harvest Lane
Look inside house that's abandoned
The Division of Code Enforcement and the Toledo Health Department are responsible for declaring an abandoned property a nuisance and uninhabitable. But the agencies are not allowed to enter a property to document interior conditions without the permission of the homeowner or landlord — if they can find them.
The agencies cannot open an unlocked door and take pictures. They have to wait for years until the outside looks as bad as the inside before they can document the situation.
Because the law keeps the agencies from doing what they are supposed to do, is it any wonder abandoned eyesores stand for years?
This law should be changed. During this financial crisis, homes go into foreclosure and are abandoned in the best of neighborhoods. It happened in mine.
Joy Hull
Copland Boulevard
Better approach to iceberg problem
An Aug. 19 Readers' Forum letter, “Laws of physics can't be violated,” argued that ice, such as the recent berg four times the size of Manhattan that separated from Greenland, cannot effect a rise in sea level.
The writer said to take a glass half full of water, fill the top half with ice, and watch it melt. He said the melted water will not elevate fluid any higher in the glass. The example starts from a false premise.
As its name implies, Greenland is not water but solid land. The glacier fell from its surface into the ocean. The correct example is to take that glass and fill it to the top with rock and soil, then place your large ice cube on top of that. When it melts, you will have fluid not only immediately around the glass but also extending several feet and even yards away.
As the letter writer said, try this yourself. See what a mess you will have to clean up.
Gary Madrzykowski
Grosse Pointe Parkway