Words - And a Few Bits

The few bits first off...  Jockey Mike Smith will ride in thirteen of the fourteen Breeders Cup Championship races this weekend, and I'll be cheering him on.   ...   Graydar, one of the early favorites in the BC Dirt Mile, will not be running in the race.  He was found to have a quarter-crack in his left fore yesterday morning.  ...   And, here in Colorado, an 18-month-old paint colt, named Rocket, is earning the nickname "Accident." Before his first birthday, he somehow became trapped on his side underneath a parked horse trailer in his pasture; then he got tangled up in a wire fence.  Yesterday morning, he was found upside down in a water well, having opened the gate to his paddock and gone exploring. The colt was rescued, after being sedated, and, other than some scrapes and bruises, seems to be well.  This photo was taken of him being pulled out of the well:

Rocket was covered with blankets and massaged for warmth and to help with blood flow, and when he wanted to stand, was allowed to.  He walked under his own power back to his stall, where one of his equine friends was standing to offer comfort.  This morning, his owner reported that he was eating and drinking well.

                                                             ***********

Words.  Our language can be used to up-lift something (or some one) to an unbelievable glorified height, or to denigrate and bury the same thing (or person) in the lowest depths of antipathy.  Certain words have become politically incorrect as times have changed, and I can accept the banning of words used as racial epithets.  Words that were once commonly used are now offensive to those of certain races.  I have never had to suffer from racial words, as I am most definitely "white" by classification...  I have grey hair now, but it used to be reddish brown, and I have grey-green colored eyes, and a very pale skin that freckles and reddens in the sun.  My ethnic background is, in the main, Swedish, Danish, and English (even though the English are and were a huge polyglot of peoples through the ages of history); and I do have a few drops of Native American in my blood, too.  My 16th-great grandmother was a Native American;  my 12th and 13th-great grandmothers were reputed to be Native Americans; and my great-grandmother might have been half Cherokee  (her father had four wives, three white and one Cherokee - and Nancy's mother is not documented)...

  I started writing this because of the calls of different people to change the name of a football team - the Washington Redskins.  While actually based in Maryland, they are representative of our country's capitol, Washington, D. C.  - and, thus, it can be expanded that the team itself represents all of the people who live in the United States of America.  Personally, I do not find the name "Redskins" to be controversial, even though a great many people do.  The first Europeans to venture to what is now the U S were "white" people; the native people they encountered had a darker cast to their skin,and frequently had broken blood vessels in their eyes.  The "white" people called these native "red" people; then the "white" people brought "black" people to the Americas in ownership, as slaves.  One of the interesting points of history is that all three of these peoples inter-married, at different times and in different places.  We have never become a truly homogeneous people, and we probably never will, due to preconceived cultural and educational differences.  But I feel we must "draw a line in the sand" somewhere - or we are going to have to invent a whole new language and vocabulary for the entire world to use.  Because of our huge gene pool, I believe that there will always be differences in skin color and tone, as well as eye and hair color.  Why can't we accept our differences and enjoy them?

  As for the "Redskins" - I, personally, do not see the word as a "bad" word; it was used to differentiate.  If we stop using the word Redskin or Indian in our everyday language, shouldn't we then not use any word that might have any connotation of Native Americans?  We'd have to stop using the following words - chief, maiden, warrior, gatherer, loin cloth, breech cloth, leather, buckskin, bows, arrows, lance, spear, snare, trap, feather, totem, medicine man, shaman, grandmother, grandfather, maize, corn, corn meal, corn bread, corn mush, pop corn, squash, tobacco, peace pipe, pipe, hunter, etc, etc, etc ...  Do you see what I mean?

  If we follow through with banning the use of Redskins, then we should also ban the use of any color designation at all.  You couldn't say, "I live in the green house on the right."  You couldn't say that you owned a brown tabby cat, or a grey dog, or a spotted horse, or a white car...   It just gets too restrictive.  Again, I personally, don't find the word "Redskins" to be derogatory - but if you ask me about the "n-word," I'd say yes that is derogatory and an insult, in an instant, without any hesitation.