Your Opinion: The good, the bad and the ugly

Eric Biesemeyer

Jefferson City

Dear Editor:

That's not just an easy title. What happened?

The good: the Blues met Stanley, the Chiefs won a big football, the Cardinals made the playoffs, again! That is a great story!

The bad: We got hit by a tornado in the early morning of May 22, 2019. The tornado destroyed many people's lives, but no one died and we are rebuilding. A little slower but it is still happening.

A lot of good came out of that disaster. Our community held hands and hammers to help our fellow man/woman. We got to know some amazing people in our community. I cannot name them all but Laurel Dunwoody of Love2Nourish who dropped everything, including profit to support our first responders and volunteers with food and support.

I was working on my practicum for master's degree at Lincoln University for mental health when the tornado hit and I got to go to several meetings to try to expand to the community about getting help to all those that needed it. FEMA, The United Way, Habitat for Humanity all came together to help make things right, or at least better.

The church I visit, Community Christian Church, got hit hard, but Hawthorne bank community room on Amazonas Drive has been allowing us to meet there since.

The ugly: This virus is another story. First, thank you health care front-liners, doctors, nurses and my good friend Denise, a CMA/CMT (we're also birthday buddies) who is my personal hero for putting themselves on the line every day. Even the grocery workers, thank you.

Second, humor is essential so I would like to thank Shags and Trevor in the morning at 96.7 KCMQ for keeping my mornings light and hilarious. I would be much more bitter without laughing. And, not to gild the lily, (Google it if you don't know the term) but the News Tribune here in J.C. for keeping me informed without bias. I read the paper almost daily to stay on top, thank you.

My family, immediate and in-laws, are healthy, and I love you all. I love my wife and my son, Alexander, who's second birthday I missed because of quarantine. It will be made up punkin head. The saying goes, "It's always darkest before the dawn." I've seen the dark, I'm ready for some dawn. Now, if I only had Cardinal baseball?