Opinion

There’s never much of a slow time for high school sports — at least during the school year. But this is an especially busy, and important, time of the year for Carroll County teams. Three Carroll County teams will be competing in regional basketball tournaments this week, and the Berryville High School wrestling team will try to bring home a state championship this weekend in Little Rock...

A few months ago, I wrote a column about falling — specifically, how good I am at it. I’ve fallen downstairs, upstairs, off moving vehicles, into ditches and more. My repertoire is extensive. Despite all this falling, I had never broken a major bone before. ...

Who doesn’t like the song, “Amazing Grace?” If there is a person that doesn’t love a good rendition of this classical gospel tune, I have not found him yet. I travel a lot with my job, so my radio stays on about three different stations. Most of the time, I love my gospel tunes and I drive down the highway singing along, thinking that I sound just as good as Alan Jackson, so please don’t tell me anything different!...

Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, as promised, on Monday revealed the details of a $300 million highway plan that would be funded through a variety of tax increases. The governor’s plan calls for permanently extending the state’s half-cent sales tax, increasing fuel taxes by three cents a gallon for gasoline and six cents a gallon on diesel, increasing registration fees on hybrid and electric vehicles and dedicating casino tax revenue to highways...

One early morning around 2 am, while parked in a rough area of town working as a police officer, I sat in the passenger seat nearly asleep. My training officer was at the wheel and I heard him yell loudly and jump from the car with his weapon drawn. ...

“Why’s everyone so down on the Super Bowl?” our associate editor Samantha Jones asked me on Monday. “Was it bad?” Well, no, it wasn’t bad. It’s the Super Bowl. It can’t be bad. But it wasn’t great. In case you missed it, the New England Patriots beat the Los Angeles Ram 13-3 in the big game on Sunday. ...

What we long feared has finally occurred. Seasonal sickness has hit Carroll County News, and we’ve all been afflicted in some way. I spent the past weekend holed up at home with Gideon and the kitties, half-watching TV and half-sleeping. That’s actually how I prefer to spend most weekends, but not with a side of queasiness and moderate fever...

Editor’s Note: Ronnie McBrayer, author of the Keeping The Faith column, has signed an exclusive syndication contract and his columns will no longer appear in Carroll County News. We are introducing a new column today, I Can and I Will by Rick Stanfield. We hope you enjoy it...

Last November, Arkansas voters decided that our state’s lowest-paid workers deserve a raise. By a vote of more than two to one, voters approved an initiated act that would gradually increase the state’s minimum wage from $8.50 to $11 an hour by 2021...

It’s safe to say we’ve all screwed up at some point. Maybe you forgot to go to your best friend’s birthday party or selfishly insisted on watching Rock of Love even though your partner was sick and trying to sleep. I’ll plead guilty to one of these things; you guess which one. I’ll also plead guilty to needing to issue an apology every once in a while...

“Once upon a time there were a fisherman and his wife who lived in a hovel by the sea.” So begins a story by the Brothers Grimm, a story not as well known as “Cinderella” or “Hansel and Gretel,” or many of their other tales, but just as lasting in its own right. The fisherman, living in wretched poverty, sees his luck change when he nets a large, exquisite fish early one morning. This fish speaks to him...

As the Arkansas State Legislature continues its 92nd General Assembly in Little Rock, it’s a good idea for the state’s residents to pay attention. The 135 state legislators — 35 in the Senate and 100 in the House of Representatives — have been chosen by the people of Arkansas to represent their best interests in leading our state. Whether that actually happens is a matter of opinion, and of course the best opinion is always an informed one...

Growing up in Texas, snow days were rare. School let out early if there was even a chance of flurries, but that didn’t happen very often. My mom loves snow and would predict such precipitation when temperatures dipped below 30 degrees. At some point, I began to understand it was wishful thinking...

In the months after the Civil War a group met in Nashville, Tenn., to create a school for former slaves and the children of former slaves. Clinton Fisk, a Reconstruction-era bureaucrat, endowed the new enterprise with much-needed funds and a collection of abandoned Army barracks. What would become Fisk University was born — one of the oldest historically black colleges in the U.S., producing alumni like W.E.B. Du Bois, Hazel O’Leary and John Lewis...

I am not a fan of cold weather, but I am a fan of professional football. That meant last weekend was a glorious time to spend an hour, or 12, in my recliner with a cup of coffee in my hand and a warm blanket on my feet, watching football until my eyes glazed over...

Last week, I returned to work after spending one week in Dallas and another in my apartment. It was the first time I had ever taken two weeks off at a time. I don’t know about you guys, but I’m a real worker bee. When I don’t have any work to do, I go a little crazy. Fortunately, Gideon and I had plenty to do during my two weeks off...

There is a long honored Zen story about a man riding a speeding horse. As horse and rider gallop dangerously close to a small group of travelers along the same road, a man nearly trampled calls out to the rider, “Where are you going in such a hurry?” The man on horseback desperately answers over his shoulder, “I don’t know! You will have to ask the horse!”...

Like a lot of journalists, I began my career as a sportswriter. And I became a sportswriter because I couldn’t become a professional athlete. Like a lot of young boys then and today, I grew up dreaming about playing pro baseball or football. As the realization slowly dawned on me in my high school years that I wasn’t going to accomplish that dream, I moved in a new direction...

Two weeks ago, Gideon and I left Carroll County to spend the holidays with my family in Texas. So much has changed since I was a little girl, but we still have Christmas dinner at Nana’s house. It used to be me, Mom, Nana, Uncle Doug and Papaw Jimmie...

Each year the San Francisco LightHouse for the Blind grants the Holman Prize, a $25,000 award given to a blind individual to adventurously explore the world. The inaugural recipient was Ahmet Ustunel, a Turkish national who has always refused the label of “handicapped” or “disabled.”...

An open letter to Bob Ballinger: Dear Bob, I hope this letter finds you well. I’ve been a little concerned about you lately, especially after learning that you weren’t able to pay your state income tax for 2017, which led the state Department of Finance and Administration to issue a lien against you. Of course, when we talked last week, you said there wasn’t supposed to be a lien at all because you were making payments on your tax debt...

I hope it’s not too soon to say it, but you probably spent too much money this holiday season. It’s understandable, and I am not without compassion for you or your bank statement. Your list was no doubt long, those on it probably had expensive tastes, and you were expected to spend more than you had...

Hey, Mr. Kringle. Can I go ahead and call you Kris? I feel like we should be on a first-name basis by now. I have been writing you for more than 20 years now, and occasionally peeping through your window using those night-vision binoculars you brought me in 2006. I say this with no judgment, but you might want to consider closing the blinds before undressing at night. There are creeps out there, you know?...

“It was a beautiful moonlit night, frost on the ground, white almost everywhere,” said Albert Moren as he recalled a Christmas Eve more than hundred years ago. “And they sang ‘Silent Night.’ I shall never forget. It was one of the highlights of my life.”...

Growing up in a small town in southwest Arkansas, I knew everyone and they knew me. You may think Berryville is small, but I grew up in a town with a population of 815. Now that’s small. You knew the cashier at the only grocery store in town. You knew the old man playing checkers outside and the little girl cradling chocolate milk behind you...

Christmas traditions are hardly monolithic. The season is celebrated with as much colorful variety as the pretty paper and shiny ribbons encasing the gifts under the tree. And speaking of that tree, history suggests that Reformer Martin Luther decorated the first Christmas tree, a celebration of God sending light into the world. This is impossible to confirm, but Luther’s native Germany was indeed the first to popularize the tradition...

While most people in Carroll County spent last weekend waiting for a snowstorm that never arrived, I was nearly 200 miles south, enjoying a weekend with family that combined an early Christmas celebration with a belated third birthday party for my youngest grandson...

To Whom it May Concern The Eastern Carroll County Ambulance Commission would like to provide Emergency Medical Responders in the areas currently not served by volunteer responders. An Emergency Medical Responder is a volunteer who provides immediate lifesaving care to patients that access the emergency medical services while awaiting ambulance arrival, and assisting ambulance personnel once on scene...

A friend gave me a little book a few weeks with a startling title: “Sum: Forty Tales From The Afterlives,” written by neuroscientist David Eagleman. My first thought was that it was about people who had come back from the dead, as there is a whole genre of such books today...

This January marks my fifth anniversary with Gideon. It has been five years of growth, frustration and joy, with each year bringing a new challenge. He started graduate school in 2016, and we are almost done with that journey. That’s certainly the best thing to call it — no journey is complete without its detours, which we know all too well. ...

“Blessed are you Lord our God, King of the universe, who has commanded us to kindle the Hanukkah lights.” With these words of blessing, Jews across the globe will begin a holiday celebration this week, a celebration older than any December tradition observed in the West...

Last week, my dad celebrated his birthday. I messaged him saying I hoped he had a great day and I love him, and he returned the sentiment. We talked a little about plans for the holidays — the kind of small talk most people would consider normal. But that wouldn’t have happened two years ago...