I’m sure you are wondering why I have selected these three ‘F’ words for my next A-Z challenge. It may surprise you.
Recently, a well-known sports figure has left this world. I have never said that I am a sports fan, but I manage to watch the final series games of hockey (our local team is the Calgary Flames), and Canadian football (our local team is the Calgary Stampeders). There is a Canadian Major Baseball team, the Bluejays, but they never play in Western Canada, so I muster some enthusiasm for the Seattle Mariners, especially when our American family take us to a game during our visit with them in Seattle.
For the first time that I can remember, I did some reading and watching the news because I recognized the name, Frank Gifford. He was an American football player and television sports commentator. After a 12-year playing career as a running back and flanker for the New York Giants of the National Football League (NFL), he was a play-by-play announcer and commentator for 27 years on ABC's Monday Night Football. That was his career, but I knew nothing about him as a person until I watched his wife, Kathy Lee Gifford, co-host of the TODAY show, returned to be interviewed on the show. If you haven’t heard the interview, here is the link to that interview.
Fernando Ortego is one of my favorite musicians. His music embraces country, classical, Celtic, Latin American, world, modern folk and rustic hymnody. I first heard his name when he was invited by the Billy Graham family to sing at Ruth Graham’s funeral. The song he sang was ‘Give Me Jesus’, and it was the first time I heard it. It keeps running through my mind, at the most unexpected times.
Finally, I come to the third ‘F’ word. The first time I saw a picture of a Flex, I thought it looked like a ‘box on wheels’. We contacted a dealer who had previously found a vehicle for us at the local auto auction mart, and told him that we were looking for a reliable van in good condition and at a reasonable price. He suggested that we have a look at the Ford Flex. It made us both laugh, but we agreed to have a closer look. We drove across Canada with friends in our first red Flex, and to California and neighboring states with our second Flex, white in color. We still love road trips, even though they now seem to be getting shorter.
Who know what will next appear on our calendar. We do know that flexibility is an asset!
So much for my list of 'FIRSTS'!
Tags: Music Sports Transportation Blog
