Letter: How far is far enough?

keyboard, letter to the editor

To the Editor:

This past week, astronauts came back from space; it was the first splashdown since 1972, and the first using used/recycled equipment. We have become pretty used to the milage these people travel – 60 million, I think. It is a matter of context. I remember when the high school principal invited me to go with him to an out-of-town basketball game. Their farthest away, he said. What would that have been? Geneva?

Here is a different context. Rummaging through old papers I came across a copy of my Billings high school paper. It was published when I was a sophomore, in October 1941, just two months before Pearl Harbor. Reading those now distant articles, seeing how naïve we were. From the paper: My friend, the late Bob Morrison, announced that the Kyote Annual has great possibilities; the ‘“U” club fetes girls tonight; the pep club will sponsor a dance after the game Saturday night, and on.

Looking back, we understand that there was no hint of the great war about to begin. Context. How far is far enough? This same week, we learn more about bringing home our troops from Afghanistan and our longest war ever.

The football schedule gives an example of context. The team had downed Sheridan, Wyoming, 19 to 0. Now, Sheridan is not only in another state, but it is 128 miles from Billings. By context that is pretty close, for the next game was to be with Helena and that is 240 miles away.

Rev. Bob Dell

Sandwich