PSoTD

There's a lot of negativity to the term "hippie" these days, and negativity to whoever may be perceived to have been one at one time. Kids tend to define hippies with one visible trait - long hair. Long-haired males are/were hippies, long-haired women could have been. Kids today aren't aware of many other visible possibilities, such as bell bottom jeans and flower power shirts, and are definitely not really aware of some subcultural aspects, such as drug experimentation and opposition to war.

I heard my six year old negatively talking about hippies earlier in the summer, and I tried to find out where he got this talk from. Not from us. Kindergarten? Friends? Neighbor kids? He seemed to have just absorbed it from the attitudes of some in Central Pennsylvania, with no specific authorship. A few weeks ago I had to pull out some photos, me and some friends when I was in high school and in college. Long hair. Facial hair.

"Dad was a hippie" he laughed.

I explained to him that there was nothing wrong about being a hippie. Some people might call me a hippie, some might not. I was a long-hair for a while. I wore jeans with holes in them before they sold them like that. People can call me a hippie if they want. I don't see it as a bad thing. Hippies did a lot of good things - they helped raise the nation's understanding to stop an awful war, they worked to make things more fair for people. They promoted love. They sought new solutions. There's a lot to respect about what the "hippies" of the 1960s and 1970s did.

I haven't heard him talk negatively about hippies since then. I can't be sure that I made a point, or if he just is smart enough to avoid the topic so he doesn't have to look at those old photos again. But I think it's time that parents quit allowing the bashing of hippies by those ignorant of the time period. And kids ought to know that having long hair certainly isn't something that should be disparaged.

I thought this was pretty sound advice.

One of our neighbors for over 12 years - and a genuinely sweet man - Harry passed away yesterday. He had been in declining health for a few years, but he still was a friendly and kind man even during his health problems, and he definitely made a rewarding impression on our kids, and my wife and I.

It's funny how you know your neighbors as they are today, and can know very little earlier history about them. Although my daughter and I had talked a few times to Harry about basketball, since she was playing and I was coaching, he never mentioned his attendance at Wilt Chamberlain's 100 point game. And it never occurred to me to "Google" Harry until the past few days.

Harry was one of the good guys, in the neighborhood and anywhere else. Our family was richer by the luck of the draw of living so close to him.

I don't know why everyone doesn't try to avoid connecting flights at this airport.

O’Hare International Airport again ranked worst among major U.S. airports for on-time departures during the first half of the year, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation.

Less than 65 percent of flights left O’Hare on time between January 1 and June 30, placing it last among 32 major U.S. airports, according to federal statistics released Monday.

O’Hare also was worst during the same period last year, but its percentage of on-time flights declined from 70.4 percent to 64.6 percent.

14 years ago, as we were coming back from our wedding in California and trying to catch a connecting flight in Baltimore to St. Lucia, we were delayed at O'Hare for 6 hours because of weather, and we vowed never to fly through there again.

My mother-in-law has had countless problems with flights through Chicago, but because she has some sort of fixation on getting flight miles through United Airlines, she still goes through there. Last night they had a big storm in Chicago, and she ended up spending the night in a hotel a half hour from the airport instead of our house.

Hopefully she'll figure it out - avoid Chicago O'Hare at nearly any cost. There's just way too many reasons why delays and cancellations happen there.