By CRAIG HALL
This is, of course, the last day of 2023 and as such, I want to thank all of you who are our supporters, the readers of our newsletter and website.
It has been a long year, but I have enjoyed it, even with the frequent 3 a.m. starts and the nights during football when I don’t get home until midnight or later.
As I drove by giant Santa Claus at the corner of Heavener’s four-way yesterday, I remembered the good times and those times that weren’t quiet as good.
One of my big highlights was covering Heavener football as the Wolves went 7-4 and made the playoffs for the first time since 2011. It was simply an awesome time. Remember, I also covered Heavener a few years ago during a 26-game losing streak and I was there for 24 of those losses.
While my primary emphasis is on Heavener, especially since I work for Heavener schools, I have continued covering the other LeFlore County schools and even stretched my coverage to include other schools from southeastern Oklahoma and some from west-central Arkansas. If nobody else is going to do so, I figure I might as well.
While I have pretty good knowledge of southeastern Oklahoma, I am learning on Arkansas. For everybody who has supported us this year or helped in some way, you will never know how much you are appreciated. I might forget to say it at times, but I thank all of you.
I hope to continue to grow and get better. I am 60 and a little over four months until 61, but I am not ready to be put out to pasture. I was thinking yesterday that since the leflorecountyjournal.com first started in 2009, the only coach who is still doing the same thing at Howe is Chris Brown at Howe. There are others such as Jeff Broyles and Dan Caldwell, but they are at different schools.
Players that I have covered over the years are now coaching, like Ryan Carter at Wister, and since I have been covering Heavener sports off and on since 1990, players I covered now have children and even grandchildren.
It’s hard for me to admit, but I simply cannot do everything I used to do. Since I had the stroke a few years ago and never recovered totally from it, I can’t drive at night or in places I that are big or I don’t know, and now I was supposed to have an operation on my neck that I put off until the summer because if I had it now, it would pretty much ruin me for the second semester. I have been dealing with the pain for a long time and hope to handle it until the summer.
I will always miss the printing aspect of our coverage and realize we are not serving everybody, but I try to make-do the best way I know how.
I simply cannot count the friends I have made over the years and the people who have helped. It is impossible to name everybody, and even if I tried, my old brain would forget somebody.
I have a couple of requests. One, please keep following and supporting our publications. The second is to please spread the word. A lot of people do not even know what we are doing. It’s today’s form of word of mouth as in social media, but if you could spread by word of mouth, that would be appreciated also.
For my many friends, I will probably not see them today, but I will see you next year.
Again, thanks and have a great 2024.
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