Donna’s Day: Camp Mail Time Junior Whirl • World Fact

KIDS &FAMILY

Donna’s Day: Creative Family Fun Camp Mail Call for Your Summer Campers

By Donna Erickson

Signal Contributing Writer

Ayellowed 4-cent postcard surfaced from the bottom of an old shoebox stashed in our attic. A classic in time, it was sent before ZIP codes and eons before cellphones and snappy e-mail.

The relic wasn’t written by some great-grandparent, but by my “boomer” husband to his parents when he was off to camp for the first time at Round Lake in northern Minnesota at the age of 10.

I’m sure his parents were waiting patiently for news of the week. Was he healthy, happy, making new friends, missing his parents — but not too much? — all those concerns we have when our kids are away from home for the first time.

Well, here’s what he wrote:

“Dear Mom and Dad,

I wasn’t going to write, but they made me write it or I couldn’t eat dinner. Camp is really fun. We won volleyball and water polo today and now tied for second place. Well, now that I got this written, I can go eat. Love, Dean”

While we like to receive any word from our kids while they’re away at sleepover camp, it’s the campers who also like to hear their name at “mail call.”

Here are some tips: • Write and send a note or two to your child’s camp via U.S. mail a few days before he leaves home.

Your child will be thrilled to hear from you the first day of camp.

Keep the letters coming. They’ll no doubt end up in a scrapbook (or shoebox) your child will treasure in years to come. • If your child is a baseball fan, remember to send clippings of box

scores of games missed while away, or send a favorite comic strip from the paper. • Tuck in addressed envelopes, stamps and a pen to encourage your child to write home. • If your child’s camp will print out your e-mailed letters, try not to overload the system. There is a fine line between keeping in touch and letting your child feel independent and “away” from his typical “at home” routine. TIP A camp experience in the outdoors can positively impact a child. Consider sending a kid to camp by providing scholarship funds for someone who might not otherwise have resources. Contact a camp of your choice or your local YMCA directly to find out how you can sponsor a camper.

Donna Erickson’s award-winning series “Donna’s Day” is airing on public

Summer camp is just around the corner.

television nationwide. To find more of her creative family recipes and activities, visit www.donnasday.com and link to the Donna’s Day Facebook fan page. Her latest book is “Donna Erickson’s Fabulous Funstuff for Families.”  © 2022 Donna Erickson

Distributed by King Features Synd.

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JULY 3, 2022

SUNDAYSIGNAL · 21 CROSSWORD TIME PUZZLES

SOLUTIONS

Opinion Unless otherwise stated, the views and opinions expressed are those of the respective authors and do not necessarily represent the views of The Signal.

READER LETTERS Biden’s Terrific Job?

Lois, Lois, Lois (Eisenberg), I think you need to be careful who you call a “mark” as you did in your letter Tuesday, June 21. It seems to me that it has come back to bite you pretty hard.

President Joe Biden has all of your ilk as “marks,” because if you will stop Trump Hating for just long enough, you will be able to see what a wonderful job Mr. Biden has done.

He has successfully gotten us out of Afghanistan with only a few of our soldiers getting killed. (By the way, I just heard what a wonderful job they are doing of processing those Afghans into our country! As of this morning, 80% of them have NOT even been processed yet!) Meanwhile, his policies have allowed tens of thousands of illegal aliens to come into our country and has done nothing to stop it.

Mr. Biden alone, by his actions, has caused prices on gasoline to rise over $2.20 per gallon since his inauguration. And on June 20, he said it could be a good thing, part of the plan to force us into electric cars. “We have a chance to make a fundamental turn toward renewable energy, electric vehicles, and not just electric vehicles but across the board,” Biden told the crowd of reporters.

His policies have allowed the Russians to destroy Ukraine by not acting fast enough when Russia was building up troops at the border. He let Vladimir Putin threaten us when we should have been standing up to him.

All of his liberal policies (and those who follow him) have allowed crime to run rampant. Police are quitting because they are getting shot, people on probation are getting guns and killing more people. No one is being held accountable unless they are conservative. Where are all the headlines of trials for the liberals who burned federal buildings in Oregon? There are none!

Lois, were you happy to see everyone getting check after check from the government? Money the government doesn’t have.

We are trillions of dollars in debt and liberal minds just want to keep giving more away. College loans paid off, for some; guaranteed income, for some; reparations for having ancestors who were slaves (in California, yet). By the way, I’m white and my ancestors were slaves!

So I would ask you again, Lois: Who is the “mark” here?

Ronald Perry Canyon Country

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ETHICALLY SPEAKING

Two Competing Moral Visions

It certainly has been quite a week. Unless you’ve been without cell coverage or WiFi, you’ve joined the rest of us in a front-row seat on the disparate reactions to the SCOTUS opinion on abortion. It is apparent there are two views on the subject and what is most interesting to me as an ethicist is that both groups claim the moral high ground.

Here’s what I mean. As individuals we all believe we are moral. That is, we all believe that, for the most part, we are ethical, moral beings. Regardless of how we may phrase them, we all instinctively ask ourselves moral questions. Am I an ethical person? Do I make moral choices? Am I an ethical shopper, neighbor, citizen? Are my beliefs those that will result in actions that contribute to the betterment of my family, my neighborhood, my world?

It appears to me that both sides of the abortion debate claim to promote the higher good. Both are shouting that their view is essential to the welfare of our country and its citizenry. Neither claim to be immoral, unethical, or dangerous even though, sadly, some on both sides accuse their opponents of being all that and more.

How can that be? How can competing truth claims both be morally correct? The answer is found in the fact that each side has its own moral vision, its own standard by which morality and ethical behavior are measured.

On one side you have the moral vision that sees abortion as a women’s rights issue, with a woman’s rights over her body trumping the rights of the baby. In fact, they refuse to see the human life in the womb as a baby. Rather, it is a non-viable tissue mass at best, and an unwanted invader in the woman’s body at worst. Their moral high ground is found on the mountaintop of a woman’s sovereignty over her own body. Such sovereignty makes the unwanted human life inside the womb expendable.

On the other side you have the moral vision that sees all human life as equal, without some hierarchy that assigns more worth to adult female life and well-being than to the human life in the womb. For this group, their moral high ground is based on the irrefutable history of mankind, which testifies that the taking of non-criminal human life is immoral.

It is also true that both sides argue for individual responsibility. Those favoring abortion argue that a woman must have sole responsibility for what she does with her body. But those opposing abortion argue individual responsibility as well, only they see it differently. They assert that women should take responsibility for having participated in the kind of sexual activity that results in the creation of human life. As you might guess, I stand with those whose moral vision is based on human history, and on the clear teaching of the Bible, that all life is created by God and therefore, to be nurtured, honored and preserved. I also believe it is the area of individual responsibility that needs to be considered more carefully.

Recently, I consigned some of my retirement funds to a financial advisor. And with each new investment vehicle he said the same thing. “All investments come with risk. The goal is to minimize that risk.”

The fact is, all of life poses some kind of risk. We enter each situation cognizant of the risks, and understand that, if we don’t want the risk, we don’t get into the car, attend a mass gathering, or neglect proper nutrition, exercise and visits to the doctor.

But imagine a person who loves to gamble going to Vegas with a pile of money. He knows the risk. He knows he might win, but he might lose. Imagine then, after he has lost most of his currency, he suddenly demands that someone else take the loss and that the house restore his money. If you’re his friend you might suggest that he stop gambling if he can’t handle losing. Or maybe he should become better at gambling to minimize the risk. But in any event, his demand not only puts the burden of his loss on someone who is not a party to that loss, but also demonstrates his own selfish, immature behavior.

It is certain the abortion issue will be with us for many years and just as certain that each group will continue to claim the moral high ground. What is needed is a close examination of the presuppositions of each side to see if those bedrock commitments are themselves moral and ethical. I don’t believe they are. It is very dangerous to call evil good, especially when you go further and declare evil as not only good but also essential.

Local resident David Hegg is senior pastor of Grace Baptist Church. “Ethically Speaking” ap-

pears Sundays. 

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