The surrogate joys of kinship and friendship
The Hump Day Hot Topics!
The Hobbs Boyz
In the late summer of 1971, my Aunt Leila Hobbs and my mother, Vivian Hobbs, were both eagerly anticipating adding new members to the Hobbs Family. On December 7, 1971, Aunt Leila gave birth to her third son and, not long thereafter, tragically passed away from her Earthly life. Her baby boy, born 50 years ago, was named "Charles" in honor of the then young patriarch, my father, Charles Hobbs. Five months later, when I debuted on May 20th, upon learning that I was a boy my father insisted that I be named after him as well, thus, for many years afterwards, there were three Charles/Chuck/Chuckie/ Charlie's in the Hobbs Clan.
While only five months older, for as long as I can remember (and even unto this very moment), Charles referred to me as his "Little Cousin" and while I was physically larger by the time we were about 14 years old, there was no mistaking that my "Big Cousin" was fiercely protective of me whenever we spent time together in Newark, Oxon Hill, Tallahassee, or down in our ancestral home of Miami. I could write a book on all of the great times and even mischief that we got into while growing up, but one of my fondest memories was when he enrolled as a freshman at Florida A&M in 1989, which was my senior year of high school, we both enrolled in my mother's Humanities class and an American History class on campus and, even though we grew up miles apart and never went to school together, we eerily shared the same passion for history and facility with writing that led to "A's" in both courses.
Years later, as my father (and his Uncle) Charles was but days from dying of cancer, my "Big Cousin" traveled from Miami and placed his newborn son, Charles Jr., into my father's arms at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. His son, who would be nicknamed "Chaz" to break up the Chuck/Chuckie/Charlie confusion, arrived just in time to ensure that three Charles Hobbs's continued after the Original Charles's passing.
As such, I consider it an honor to wish my Big Cousin/Brother Charles Hobbs, known on FAMU's campus as "Goldie the Mack," a Happy "Golden" 50th birthday--we will turn up in commemoration of this milestone once the dreaded Covid pandemic wanes...
Jeopardy! Update
I was SUPER proud last night of my Morehouse Brother, Dr. John Harkless, who repped the Maroon & White well on the Jeopardy! Professor’s Tournament; while he fell short of winning the match outright, due to the dollar amount that he earned (over $4,000 in the match) there’s still a possibility that he earns an at-large berth in the semi-finals.
After an evening in which his anxious SpelHouse family joined trivia supporters worldwide to cheer Harkless on, the Howard University chemistry professor posted the following on his Facebook page:
“You've all been great - the posts, the comments, the re-posts, the comedy, the rooting for me. A few things:
* It's not over until the wild cards are set. Watch the rest of the week!
* I didn't remember half of what happened there like it showed up on TV. That "Jeopardy! Fugue State" Katie Reed and Marti Canipe also experienced is REAL.
* They definitely turned up the difficulty for us. I don't even know where some of my answers came from.
Hey, regular life continues - I've got an exam tomorrow night and I am certain there will be lots of emails and such tomorrow, so I'm shutting it down now that my nerves are back to normal.”
Kudos again, Brother Harkless. Oh, and for my readers who are also Facebook followers that noticed that Harkless and all of our old Morehouse Quiz Bowl teammates kept using “RUDDS” in our posts last night, that acronym was coined during our playing days when, as we rolled to a 39-3 overall record from 1992-94 (one loss to S.C. State in ‘92, and narrow losses in the ‘93 and ‘94 championship games on BET to Tuskegee University), the acronym was a mantra we shouted before each practice and match:
Run Up Da Damn Score = RUDDS
NFL Star Dead in Alabama
Admittedly, I had never heard of former New Orleans Saints defensive end Glenn Foster Jr. until news reports last night noted that he had died while in police custody in Pickens County, Alabama after fleeing and eluding police officers.
Foster, a Chicago native, starred at the University of Illinois before signing as a free agent with the Saints, where played for two seasons. After his playing days were done, he and his wife founded the Southern Louisiana Granite company, which he still owned at the time of his death.
While we await autopsy results that will then be turned over to the Tuscaloosa District Attorney's office for review, I will refrain from rushing to final judgement, but will say that my Jedi instincts sense a "great disturbance in the force" when a completely healthy and strong man turns up dead in police custody.
Stay tuned...
Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett and the Abortion rights cases
Many within the mainstream media are reporting this morning that cries continue for United States Supreme Court Justice Amy C. Barrett to recuse herself based on a law review article that she helped pen the late 1990s where she juxtaposed Catholic jurists faith against their interpretation of secular law.
In 1998, Barrett, then a federal judicial clerk, co-authored Catholic Judges in Capital Cases, published in the Marquette Law Review, where she argued that judges were “obliged by oath, professional commitment, and the demands of citizenship to enforce the death penalty, but they are also obliged to adhere to their church’s teaching on moral matters.” Barrett's article concluded that Catholic judges are “morally precluded from enforcing the death penalty, " while further adding that the remedy is for a Catholic judge to recuse themselves, arguing “…(Catholic judge) can neither enforce the death penalty and violate religious conscience, nor fail to enforce it and violate oath of office."
Now, some will surely argue that no jurist should be held to words that they wrote 23 years ago; having written for 30 years myself, I look back on some of my older pieces and see where my political beliefs have shifted from center-right to center-left through the years.
Perhaps the same shifting beliefs holds true for Justice Barrett? I doubt it, and my doubt stems from the fact that while my political views have shifted over the past three decades, my religious beliefs are very much the same as they have been since I was a young usher at New Salem MB Church in the 1980's. Thus, I suspect that Justice Barrett's religious views are likely the same as well, but I doubt very seriously that she, like the other six Catholics on the Court, will recuse herself on ruling on the abortion issue based upon adherence to their faith.
Stay tuned…
Thank you for subscribing to the Hobbservation Point--have a wonderful Wednesday!
But ACB’s question if foster care and adoption can pick up the slack if abortion is struck down is terrifying on a many levels. Among them are:
1) It’s a ridiculous question not based on anything;
2) is she not aware that there are over 400K children currently in foster care?
And the other Catholic justices aren’t writing papers injecting their faith into their opinions.
Wonderful!