Pee BEFORE you get on the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

I’ve been on-the-road and apologize for ignoring my duties here. I’ll post later today.

My old colleague and friend Jim Cummins has died, and I am sad. Jim and I were part of an amazing team at WTMJ-TV in the early and mid 70s and had stayed in touch. Like my other friend who died this year, Pete Wilson, Jim was a big early influence.

I use a story about Jim whenever I speak with budding journalists. When he came to WTMJ-TV from Grand Rapids, he was that station’s top reporter. I ran the desk, and Jim didn’t like that he had to wait in the wings while all the tenured reporters at the station got all the good assignments. Hey, that’s life.

One day, he came to me and asked, “What time do you get to work?”

“7 o’clock,” I replied.

“Tell you what,” he said, “if I have a story idea for you at 7 a.m., would you consider giving me a shooter instead of waiting until you’ve set up the day?”

What AE would disagree with that?

His first piece was on a local toy company that had stopped making a certain toy, because the manufacturer couldn’t get the petroleum necessary to make the thing. The year was 1973. The first line in the piece was this: “The Birdie Ball has gone the way of the energy crisis.” It was an outstanding piece, and it wasn’t but a few weeks until Jim was our top dog reporter. Nobody was surprised when he went to NBC Nightly News.

He loved the resources of the network. I remember a call from him while covering a tornado in rural Missouri. He arrived on a chartered plane at the local landing strip known as the airport, only to discover they had no car rental place. The guy who ran the joint had an old beater, though, so Jim (er, NBC) bought it.

I loved Jim Cummins. He was an amazing storyteller, a great husband and father, and my dear old friend.

Farewell, Jim.

This is a bit of a personal post, for I’m about to change something that’s been with me for years. Effective with my next essay, which will likely be published later today, I’m changing the title of the series from “TV News in a Postmodern World” to “Local Media in a Postmodern World.” I want to explain to you why.

When I first started writing about new media, I stayed within my comfort zone, television news. After all, I’d been a news manager for 28 years before retiring in 1998 and getting into the Internet. I could see where things were going and tried to shout warnings, although I have to admit that few people were listening.

I wrote about the news business and journalism’s history. I argued objectivity versus argument and became a voice on some level in the discussion of journalism’s evolution.

However, when I began consulting, the question from media companies was always, “Where’s the money?” Hence, my emphasis has changed over the years, and this is especially so since joining AR&D in the summer of ‘06. The reality is that professional journalism needs money to do its thing, so following the money — the business side of media — became my passion.

More and more, my writing began to reflect this. I didn’t really drift away from journalism as much as I drifted towards the business of news — and that includes broadcasting AND print.

So I’m changing the name. Besides, I think “Local Media in a Postmodern World” will make a better book title. Don’t you?

Anybody with a strong back is welcome at my place this weekend, as I’m moving from my apartment with its trees and squirrels for neighbors to a house a few miles away with trees and squirrels for neighbors. I doubt that I will be blogging at all during the next few days, because before I move, I’m off to Seattle for a blogger meet-up sponsored by a client, KOMO-TV. 184 people have given us their RSVP as of this writing, so it should be a heck of a party. I’ll bring pictures back, and if you live in the Seattle area, please come by and say hello.

A corporate executive called me “cerebral” during a meeting yesterday, which is something you don’t hear every day. The subsequent swelling of my cerebrum made it difficult to get out the door.

And so it goes…

What’s with all these old friends and acquaintances passing away?

Today, it’s Tom Synder, host of NBC’s “Tomorrow” show, which came on after Carson in the 70s. The picture at the right was taken at the Milwaukee Press Club’s annual dinner in 1979. I was chairman of the event, and I arranged for Tom to get the “Sacred Cat” award, a high journalism honor in the community. Tom grew up there and was most appreciative of the award, thanking me in a note especially for how happy the event had made his mother.

His career began in news in Milwaukee, and he eventually anchored in Philadelphia and Los Angeles before leaving the news business to do “Tomorrow” in 1972. He was, in many ways, the prototypical news anchor of the 70s, but he was an extremely intelligent and witty man.

No comments about my appearance, please.

Tom died this weekend of complications from leukemia. Tom Synder, gone at the age of 77 but not forgotten.

My dear old friend Pete Wilson, a television legend in San Francisco, has passed away, and I am sad. He was only 62, and died of a massive heart attack during surgery for a hip replacement.

Pete and I were best friends during the 70s, when we both worked the morning shift at WTMJ-TV. I can honestly say I’ve never been closer to a man in my life than I was with Pete back then. We were inseparable, and since we were on the same schedule, our private lives were intertwined as well. Some weeks, we’d leave after the noon show and play golf Monday through Friday.

Pete was a terrific and passionate golfer. Big and strong, he could hit the ball a friggin’ mile and we were always competitive. I remember one round when I had him by a shot going to the last hole. He kept trying to psych me out, but I hit a great drive. We walked and laughed, and Pete seemed resigned to the fact that I was going to beat him. My ball was up the left side of the fairway, about 20 yards in front of a big bunker and 120 yards from the pin. He walked with me and then headed to his ball 20 to my right. As he left, he said, “Don’t hit it in the bunker,” which I then proceeded to do. I bogied the hole. He made birdie and beat me by a stroke. Damn.

I also remember a Christmas morning when we were both working. Cognizant of the reality that nobody was watching the 6am news on Christmas day, Pete brought his famous holiday egg nog. It was mighty tasty at 4am, but it also went straight to the brain on an empty stomach. I’ll never know how he got through the newscast.

Pete, I love you and I pray that God is holding you now in His everlasting arms. May you rest in peace, my dear friend.

Everybody who travels has stories like these, but not everyone who travels has a blog with which to share them.

I was in Seattle on business last week and was scheduled to come home to Dallas mid-afternoon Friday. I got to the airport in plenty of time and was relaxing near gate A-8 when a crowd started to gather around the desk. My rapier quick mind assumed something was up, so I meandered that way and discovered that my flight — and others to Dallas — had been cancelled due to severe storms in North Texas.

Okay, I thought. I have a First Class ticket, so I’ll just get on the next flight. Well, it turns out that wasn’t until 5:35pm Saturday, over 24 hours later. I did what everybody else did and attempted to make arrangements with other airlines, but I ended up at the airport Hilton.

What exactly does one do for 24 hours under such circumstances? I should add that I was exhausted from the trip and out of clean clothes — a risk of “traveling light.” Restless, agitated and exhausted, I found I couldn’t sleep. Moreover, a group of Africans occupied most of the rooms on my floor and they had a serious party going on. They also chose the hallway to make cellphone calls, so even my ear plugs didn’t work. I was in that state where you get between asleep and awake, so I never really got any rest.

Saturday morning came, and guess what? There is nothing but infomercials and bad cartoons on Saturday morning television. It was raining, so I couldn’t just go for a walk. Work, I thought. I can work. Nope. I had no juice whatsoever. So I relived the last few years of my life by looking at pictures on my computer. That took an hour. I played computer games. I went to the gift shop several times.

Mostly, I just got mad.

Checkout was noon, so that meant a lovely afternoon at the airport. At least I could watch people there. A woman was tossing a rubber football with her son. She threw like a girl. A teenager dressed like a hooker read Cosmo in the corner. Two young boys raced back and forth on the escalator moving sidewalk. A man in a yellow jacket slept on one of the benches.

I can’t remember how many times I heard the woman say not to leave your carry on items unguarded.

I walked this way and that. I bought one day’s wireless service from at&t and checked mail. Nobody writes on Saturday. I browsed the gift shops and bought some Starbucks. I ate a cookie. I went back to the gate and the woman was still throwing like a girl.

My heart sank when they announced that my flight was delayed 45 minutes. I couldn’t even let my mind get near ANOTHER night at the Hilton. Imagination can be an awful thing sometimes.

Eventually, I got home to my dog and my comfy bed. I realize today that I completely missed the 31st of March, 2007.

(Pan to Rod Serling) Limbo, they say, is like purgatory, perhaps worse than hell itself. For Terry Heaton, there is indeed no place like home — returning from a day like no other — a day that time forgot — a tormenting journey into — the Twilight Zone.

Okay, folks, it’s time to talk about the ESPN NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament Challenge. Every year I do this, and every year I get pretty close to the top. So here are my entries:

I have the final four in two of my brackets, including #1, which is always my best guess. In that bracket, Georgetown wins it all. In bracket #3, I also have the final four, but I’ve got Ohio State winning it all in that one.

Sorry, but I think Florida and UCLA will burn each other out in the semi-finals, a rematch of last year’s championship game. I just don’t see either having it in them to win one more after that game.

My best finish was three years ago, when I came in tied for 300th (out of 3 million entries).

I’m on-the-road on biz these days and doing all sorts of stuff that actually puts food on the table (and the squirrels’ table), so I haven’t been able to write much here. Lots to say, though, so I’ll try to get to some of it on the plane and post it tonight.

Be good while I’m gone.

Whatever.

Okay, here we go again.

Those of you who’ve been long-time readers will recall that I went without health insurance for several years while building my company. I’ve written posts about the “private pay discount” for health services that is relatively universal. What it means is that if you pay cash at the time of services, you get a 30% discount. I’ve used this to make the case that this 30% is funny money that drives the cost of health insurance — not necessarily healthcare — up, up, up.

Last year, I got health insurance, but I’m paying close attention to it, because I pay premiums in addition to a hefty deductible. Last fall, I decided to get a physical, because I turned, ugh, 60 in July. The doctor ran me through a lot of tests, including a cat scan of my sinuses. I told her and her office people that I did NOT want the test, unless insurance paid for it. They checked with the people who would do the cat scan, who researched with my insurance company and said it would be covered.

I got a bill for $955.

The insurance company “applied it to my deductible,” which is the same as me paying for it. But here’s the interesting part. The original bill was $1,364, which the insurance company used their “discount” to reduce to $955 (what discount?). If, however, I had walked in off the street and paid cash for the test, it would’ve cost $887, according to the business office of the clinic.

So what’s the real cost of the service? That, my friends, is the question we all ought to be asking, and one that I’m not sure universal health insurance would answer.

I have no recourse but to pay the bill, despite the fact that I would NEVER have had the test knowing it would’ve come out of my pocket. The physical problem just wouldn’t have been worth it. The fault is mine, because I trusted the doctor’s office to get it right. From now on, I’ll make the call myself.

And so it goes…

It came and it went, and the temperature outside my Grapevine, Texas apartment is rising. I always sigh with relief when I know that an early Spring is certain. The flowers, the warmth, all of God’s creatures being twitterpated — these are the things that make life worthwhile.

So it was with joy that I discovered nearly unanimous consensus among the country’s groundhogs about an early end to winter. Only in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin did Jimmy the Groundhog see his shadow and run for his burrow, predicting another six weeks of winter. But, hey, that’s Wisconsin, for crying out loud.

Punxsutawney Phil from Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania — the “real” groundhog — says we’re having an early spring. So does Wiarton Willie over in Wiarton, Pennsylvania Ontario. Same with Mona the Groundhog in Southwest Florida, Woodstock Willie and Cloudy from the Chicago area, and General Beauregard Lee in, of course, Georgia.

Woody the Woodchuck in Howell Michigan didn’t see his shadow either, so he’s predicting an early spring for Michigan. Michigan? What does he know? He’s a bloody woodchuck.

I’m going with the majority. Where’s my suntan oil?

I took the 9am flight from Dallas to Atlanta on American Airlines Monday. It’s apparently a popular flight for business travelers. When they began boarding the flight and made the announcement that it was time for “Executive Platinum” and “Platinum” travelers to board (note to self: you WANT to be one of these), over half the people in the boarding area stood up and boarded the plane.

So much for the logic of “group” boarding. It took forever to load the plane, because over half the seats were taken by the time they called “Group One.”

For the record, I’ve reached “Gold” level since joining AR&D, and that allows me to board with Group One. With the volume of travel I’m doing, Platinum is in my sights.

But regardless of your boarding status, you have no control over who sits next to you. I always book aisle seats on the chance that the center seat won’t be occupied. Not so on this flight. A woman weighing over 300 pounds claimed the center seat, and when the arm rests went down, several inches of her flopped out onto my seat. I felt sorry for her, sorry for me (try a 90-minute flight with your hip butt tucked up against another), and mostly I felt sorry for the poor guy in the window seat. He couldn’t very well lean away, so he was really crushed.

Such is travel. Sometimes you’re the windshield; sometimes you’re the bug.

I arrived in Atlanta and checked in at the Sheraton Hotel near the Airport to discover this note in my 10th floor room:

We would like to inform you that starting Monday, January 29, we will begin work on all of our exterior windows. Please do not be alarmed if you notice workers outside your windows. For your privacy please keep the curtain closed during the daytime hours.

It gave me a nice chuckle upon arrival in Atlanta and helped me turn the page on a difficult flight.

I’m off to Huntsville, Alabama, and the big, stupendous, spectacular 16th birthday bash for my youngest daughter, Larissa. Woo hoo!!

Look out, Huntsville drivers.

Then it’s off to points east and client visits and presentations. I’ll be making entries from the road and should be back in the saddle next Thursday. I’m flying USAirways (Oh no!), so at least I’m assured it’ll be an adventure.

TTFN

Since my return from Amman and my immersion into the Arab culture, I’m extremely sensitive to crap like what happened to an Arab traveler at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas last week. This is a horrible story that suggests we are no better than the terrorists we’re trying to exterminate from the world. The consequences of our behavior may be unintended, but behavior is what others observe. And you can’t talk your way out of something you’ve behaved your way into.

Here’s the story, as reported Wednesday in The Las Vegas Sun.

German national Majed Shehadeh and his wife, Joanne Mulligan, had scheduled a surprise holiday visit with their daughter in California. Wanting to avoid LAX (because they’d been detained there 2 1/2 years ago), they went through Las Vegas. Mulligan traveled several days ahead of her husband, and when she went to the airport to get him last Thursday, she found he had been detained.

The 62-year old Shehadeh, a Syrian native, has a heart condition and was denied his own prescription medicine. He was held incommunicado, taken to a detention center, where his wife was refused access to him, went without medication for 36 hours, had nose bleeds and heart palpitations, and was eventually put on a plane back to Germany four days later.

Mulligan tried everything but was treated rudely and the holiday weekend worked against her.

Shehadeh told AP in a phone interview from his home in Alzenau, a small Bavarian village, that he had given an official at McCarran his German passport “and he looked to see which countries I visited. He found I had stamps that looked like Arabic and asked if they were fake.”

“Nobody ever informed me why I was being questioned,” he said. “All that was ever told to me was this had to do with Washington.”

An aide to (Rep. Diane) Feinstein later told the family that Shehadeh was on a “look-out list,” Mulligan told AP.

Mulligan, born in Massachusetts, retired as a math teacher for the U.S. military. She has lived in Germany since marrying, and the couple has visited the United States many times over the years. In 1996 she founded a nonprofit organization called People in Motion to help people in need, including children in Afghanistan and women in Bosnia.

Her husband’s detention “has to do with that we’re Muslim, that’s all,” she said.

Daughter Majida Shehadeh said, “When you’re a Muslim, you expect you’re going to get this in airports - a little more runaround. But being detained like this - it’s unbelievable. It’s unacceptable.”

The family is demanding to know why Shehadeh was detained and asks a curious question. “If he was a bad guy, why did they let him go? And if he was a good guy, why didn’t they let him join his family?” And according to the International Herald Tribune of Europe, the German government also wants an explanation.

Officials from the Germany’s Consulate General in Los Angeles will write shortly to U.S. immigration authorities in Las Vegas to ask why Shehadeh was detained, a spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin said Thursday.

The consulate also will ask why U.S. officials allegedly relieved Shehadeh of his prescribed heart medicine, and why the immigration authorities did not inform the consulate about the case.

The spokesman said the consulate was following up a complaint from the man’s relatives that officials had taken away his medicine. Shehadeh has filed no formal complaint, he said.

A representative of the land of the free and the home of the brave (Oh, that’s us!) would only say that Shehadeh was detained, something we already knew.

I shudder at this kind of stuff, because I picture it happening to my family. I just cannot imagine what my daughter and her children would suffer, if this kind of thing happened to Waseem. I mean, it’s one thing to exercise security measures, but it’s quite another to dehumanize people in the process. Even if this man was some sort of threat, which I doubt, there is no justification for separating him so completely from his frightened and concerned family.

Way to go, Homeland Security. You’ve just lowered us, once again, in the eyes of a watching world.

I was Assignment Editor for WTMJ-TV in Milwaukee when Gerald Ford became president. AEs are a curious lot, and I spent every waking moment on a search for news. It wasn’t something I could turn off; it just was my default setting.

While looking at a very old magazine that I had in a collection, I came across an ad for the “Jerry Ford Wonder Stories” — four books by Fenworth Moore published in 1931.

WRECKED ON CANNIBAL ISLAND or Jerry Ford’s Adventures Among Savages
LOST IN THE CAVES OF GOLD or Jerry Ford Among the Mountains of Mystery
CAST AWAY IN THE LAND OF SNOW or Jerry Ford Among the Polar Bears
PRISONERS ON THE PIRATE SHIP or Jerry Ford and the Yellow Men

I wrote a letter to Reuven Frank at NBC, then Executive Producer of NBC Weekend with Lloyd Dobyns. I loved the show and thought they might be interested in the story. Frank loved the idea, and Dobyns went to the Library of Congress to read the books. Their story was pretty funny, and Frank sent me a check.

I got to know Reuven Frank after that, and he taught me much — including the reality that even in television, there are stories that only warrant a picture with a caption. I sold him other ideas for Weekend, including Pet Sharks and Neon Dance Floors. Disco was dawning (I’m so old), and the first blinking dance floors were made in Milwaukee.

This connection opened other doors for me, but mostly it taught me a lesson on the power of mass media, especially television. An Assignment Editor from Milwaukee could influence the whole world through the simplicity of creative ideas. Scary, but true.

Jerry Ford, RIP.

The copyright industry is America’s largest export, something I learned just a few years ago. We still make and sell products and services, but Hollywood is at the top of the list. We sell our decadence to the rest of the world, and they’re buying it. I think the average American gives little thought to this, and yet it is by this that we are judged.

We’re proud of our smut, aren’t we?

I have written many times about the greed of the copyright industry and how this greed is one of the key fuels in the disintermediation of all forms of media — the unbundling thereof. For years, we’ve been forced to pay $18 for a music CD, for example, when all we wanted was one song. We sat through endless commercial interruptions while watching TV, because we had no choice. All of that is changing as media is unbundling and we are rebundling it for ourselves.

This is a central tenet of the Personal Media Revolution (PMR), and it’s important to understand that — in many ways — this same copyright industry brought it on themselves. When any industry begins suing its customers, as the RIAA has done in the U.S., one can safely assume it has lost its way.

On the streets of downtown Amman, amidst the juice stands, perfume sellers, clothing shops and variety stores, exists a type of shop that must gall the copyright cartel. For one Jordanian Dinar (about $1.50), you can buy any DVD or video game available. The quality is not guaranteed, but I can tell you that most work just fine. You can even buy films that are only available in theatres in the U.S.

I bought a couple for the 11-hour flight from Frankfurt to Dallas tomorrow. Sue me, Hollywood. I forgot where I bought them.

One day, these shops may be driven from the streets by Jordanian-U.S. relations, but that will only drive the dealers elsewhere. This isn’t the U.S., and our reach just isn’t what we think it is. The economy here is whatever the people can make it to be, and if you could witness the poverty for yourselves, you’d bless their ingenuity as I have. After all, it isn’t the tourists who walk the streets of downtown Amman to shop; it’s the people who live here.

I should add that the idea of copyright doesn’t exist in Islam. Artists are recognized and compensated for their work, but after that, it belongs to the public. This no doubt influences those who buy and sell these movies and video games.

And shopping itself is considerably different here than in the West. Every shop is run by the person who owns it. The store often displays a photo of the shopkeeper’s father, the man who most likely built the business years ago. Franchises exist only in the suburbs or at the malls (A big new mall is opening Wednesday. All the women are excited.)

Prices are sometimes shown on merchandise tags but the actual price can vary widely based on where the shopper is from or how skilled the shopper is in bargaining. The shopkeepers have deep insight into the characteristics of Arabs from various countries, and they can alter their smile (and the cash register) accordingly. Waseem is a pro, but when they see me, the price suddenly goes up.

I will be leaving Amman at dawn tomorrow, and I am sad. Soon I will be back in my office with Piffy and feeding my squirrels, for this is my world. But I return a changed man, for I will never view events in the Middle East the same way, nor will I have the same biased and intolerant perspective that I’ve had about the people here. Such things are learned, and what is learned can be changed by personal experience.

This is one of the reasons that I have such hope for the future — the world that all of my daughters and their children will inherit. The internet offers the opportunity for us to learn from each other, not textbooks or one-sided histories. This can only bring us together, and I believe this is God’s will for the human race. The few people I’ve reached by sharing my trip here have knowledge they didn’t have before, and that’s just one person’s journal.

I am most sad, because I will miss my family. But even that is tempered by the warmth in my heart for them, the knowledge that I will return soon, and a conviction that we’ll use this amazing technology to talk to each other in ways our parents couldn’t even imagine. There is no distance in the world of the spirit, and it is here where we will always be together.

Mas salamah from Amman.

Finding your way around in Amman takes courage and a strong knowledge of the area. Only main roads are named. There are no “addresses,” because the houses aren’t numbered. This means directions must include landmarks — a shop on the corner, a sign, a building, or some anomaly that is identifiable.

Once you have directions, however, there’s the small matter of driving the streets. Horns sound everywhere, as drivers position themselves according to their needs (and regardless of yours), and near misses are commonplace. A two lane road becomes a four lane road simply because the drivers decide they can make it so. Lane markings? Who cares? It’s all about getting where you’re going. Defensive driving will leave you at the curb. Aggression is what’s needed here, aggression and a hand on the horn.

Waseem is a veteran driver here, and he wove in and out of traffic with a skill that New York cab drivers would envy. He lets old men into his lane, but that’s where he draws the line. We swiped a parking place from a woman at the mall. She was there before us, but we had the advantage. Why wait?

Zig, zig, zag! That’s Amman on wheels. And it rained today, which made driving even more adventurous.

Ahead of us, a cab driver stopped in traffic to pick up a fare ON A CURVING HIGHWAY ONRAMP. We almost crashed, which brought several horn blasts and a few choice words from my son-in-law. “Idiot!”

Our destination was Mecca Mall, four floors of shopping that you might find anywhere. Prices are ridiculous, at least twice what one would pay in the States. We rode the escalators up and down, which was great entertainment for the kids, and bought an American favorite: Cinnabons.

After the mall, we drove around the ritzy neighborhoods to look at mansions under construction. These, folks, are palaces, and many of them are being built for newcomers to Amman and Jordan. In just four years, the population in Amman has gone from about one million to two and a quarter million people, many of them businessmen from Iraq who are seeking refuge for their families here. These are people with money who prospered under Sadaam Hussein, and there is concern about what would happen to Jordan’s economy if they suddenly left to return home.

The other growth engine is Palestinians, who continue to find friends, family and support in Jordan.

Construction is everywhere, and land prices have quadrupled. A small piece of land in a nice neighborhood will run upwards of a half-a-million dollars. Schools — private schools mostly — are being built to handle the influx of children. New roads are being built to accommodate new traffic patterns and all the new motorists here.

But, as I mentioned earlier, there are clearly two Ammans, and the gap between the haves and have-nots is enormous. There is no government assistance for anyone, so people make a living however they can. My daughter and son-in-law’s home is in a very nice neighborhood, but the windows are all barred, and a stone and steel fence surrounds the property.

At the end of the day, we had one more stop to make, but Jenny couldn’t join us. She was too busy holding two sleeping beauties who’d had enough of roads and shops and ice cream and escalators.

These are the moments that grandparents cherish and for which we burst with pride.

Life is, after all, a series of changing seasons, and I have had my share this year. I came here to escape Christmas, all the holiday trappings and the emotions that accompany them. What I found exceeded my expectations — and by a mile. For half-way around the world, I discovered the best holiday gift ever: my family.

Words are simply insufficient to describe what that means to me.

When most of my friends and family heard that I was coming to Amman to visit my daughter and her family, they wanted a report on how my Jenny (Jenan) was surviving in a culture that oppresses women. After all, they reason, she had given up her freedom for a life as a slave. Moreover, well-intentioned Christian friends believe she must be going to hell for embracing Islam. These are the things I have heard about my flesh-and-blood.

If these are the things you believe, then let me give you my report. I offer not an apologetic for Islam, but my own witness. I am not an expert; I am her father.

My daughter has more freedom than many women I have known in my life. The name on her driver’s license follows the Arabic tradition of bloodlines: Jennifer Terry Norris Heaton. The second name is mine. The third name is my father’s. The woman does not take the name of the man in marriage, for the covenant is one of choice. She wears the hijab (covering) not only because belief in Islam requires it (although there are many women here who do not), but she also wears it because she wants to wear it, for it honors her husband. The concept of honor is significant here, and it runs both ways.

When I visited my grandson Osama’s school, I asked to take a picture of the woman principal. She asked that I not take her picture, because it might somehow dishonor her husband. This was not a demand or law or requirement. It was her wish, and this is the nature of most of the culture.

Call it tribal, if you wish, but the family unit is everything here. If the families are strong, the culture is strong, and this Islam teaches.

As such, women are supposed to be revered in Islamic culture, and I have seen this with my own eyes. The idea that they are chattel is ancient Arabic and predates Islam. There are bad relationships and spousal abuse here, but this is also true in the West. Waseem and Jenan are very much husband and wife. All couples argue as well as kiss, but Waseem and my daughter have discovered a secret that Allie and I knew — that the commitment of love demands that you never go to bed angry.

Theirs is a love story for the ages, for Waseem faced unfathomable familial pressure to not marry an American. Their courtship included long months of separation and countless attempts to accept that they must not be together. They both endured hardship, condescension and ridicule, and yet, theirs is a textbook Islamic marriage, the fruit of which is four wonderful children.

My daughter speaks fluent Arabic, and she has worked hard at it. She is completely accepted now in the family and the community and is, in fact, considered a rare jewel to those who once questioned Waseem’s sanity in bringing an American woman into his life. I am so proud of her, for her courage and convictions exceed my own. I am proud, too, of Waseem, for he is my son. The way he cares for his family is to be envied. He is passionate and admits to a dark side, but he is warm, tactile and caring in ways that I find remarkable. If this is the influence of Islam, then who am I to find fault?

I couldn’t be more proud of Waseem, even if he was my own son.

To those whose religious convictions proclaim my daughter’s damnation, I feel sorry for you. I believe that heaven and hell are eternal conditions not bound by the laws of time and space and that the best judge of where we will “be” is not what we say or believe but how we behave in this life. For eternity touches our lives in the here and now, and “heaven on earth” is a very real experience, as is “hell on earth.” You want to know where you’re going? Take a moment to examine your heart at this moment, for it’s a pretty clear indication. You are practicing today for what will come.

I disrespect no one’s religion or their right to believe what they believe. But to suggest that my daughter is hell bound based on your beliefs is absurd by any stretch of the imagination. I am not her judge and neither are you, and frankly, if we’d just leave the world alone instead of trying to twist it to fit our wishes, I think we’d be amazed at how easily we’d all get along.

Long ago while researching the community of Albuquerque for a media company, I met a Native American who taught me something profound. In order to fully understand others, we must have what he called a “crossover” experience; we must live in their moccasins for a period. This, he argued, immediately brings the walls down, for we discover that we are all people and that we need each other. I’ve had this a couple of times in my life, and this visit to Amman has been another. I will never view the world the same again, and that is a blessing for which I am eternally grateful.

Today was another eventful day with my son-in-law. We went downtown to shop and look at the people. Jordanians who live in the downtown area are very poor. Nobody smiles. The place used to be thriving with people, but suburban sprawl has moved many shoppers to markets within their own communities, leaving downtown with a dwindling number of people. You could’ve fooled me, however, because I thought the place was crowded and noisy.

The experience was amazing for these foreign eyes. The smells went from the sublime to the nasty, often separated only by a few feet. Professional hucksters and beggars were everywhere, and I found myself covering my pockets. I bought some jewelry and a chess set for loved ones back home, and Waseem bought candy for the children and produce for Jenan.

We stopped at a shop that will mix any perfume scent you can imagine (or buy). One of the Arabian perfumes that they asked me to smell nearly knocked me over, because it was so awful. I told Waseem that I thought they let us smell that one to make the others smell good.

DVD and software sales are everywhere. I bought two films that are currently in theatres in the U.S. for one dinar each (about $1.50). The copyright cartel in Hollywood can’t be happy with this.

Amman is a city alive with energy.

Waseem used to teach at the University, and we spent an hour touring the place and visiting old friends. Students are students, regardless of where they’re located. Some dress conservatively; others are much more liberal. Such is youth.

Everybody loves the King, at least partly because you aren’t allowed NOT to love him (and his queen).

I need a day just to catch my breath, and I’m hoping for that tomorrow. Friday is a day of rest, and my legs sure need it.