Phone purge

So many names and numbers at my fingertips...but so few I’m actually in touch with. What to do next? Plus: luck's role in foiling would-be Presidential assassinations and a return to Wrigley Field.

If you’re like me, then you’ve accumulated a really long list of contacts on your smartphone, numbering in the hundreds, maybe approaching 1,000.

But how many of those contacts are actually people you have the ability or desire to be in touch with? I consider myself an extrovert, a “people person,” but even with that affinity for connection, the vast majority of my contacts have collected dust over the years. Some were fleeting acquaintances, while others were an integral part of my life for a significant span, only to recede in the background for any variety of reasons.

Most are somewhere in between—I expect to be in touch with some in the future, whereas others are on paths that won’t cross mine.

Reflecting on all this, I decided to wage an experiment last night, pressing a two-digit sequence to see what pops up. It’s about 120 names. Of this total, roughly one-quarter are individuals I’ve texted or called or otherwise interacted with in the last year. The rest could be filed into one of the following categories:

• Folks I’d enjoy reconnecting with

• Folks I’d be glad to say “hello” to, in passing

• Folks I wouldn’t recognize if I bumped into them on the street

• Folks I would absolutely avoid bumping into on the street

• Dead folks

Now, those first two groups—these people should stay on my phone. The last three groups—it’s time to let them go.

My list didn’t materialize overnight, so it’ll take me a while before I really begin purging the “wouldn’t recognize” and “would avoid” folks. But that last group—those who have passed away? That’s where I’m starting.

Other `Phone Purge’ Reflections:

*How many folks have me and my number on their phones? Do you, dear reader, have me on your phone? (If so, feel free to shoot me a text!)

*As for my place on others’ phones, I am sure that I fall into all the (still-alive) categories noted above.

Because I like counting stuff, I did a little survey of various contacts on my phone.

Among first names, I’ve got:

• 30 Johns (augmented by five Jons, three Jonathans, two Johnnys and one Johnnie)

• 22 Matts (and two Matthews)

• 20 Daves (plus 11 Davids)

• 19 Mikes (but only one Michael)

• 17 Dans (and two Daniels and one Danny)

• 16 Jims (and nine Jameses)

• 15 Bills (along with five Wills and Williamses)

• 12 Toms (and two Thomases)

• Six Andys and four Andrews

• And, last but quite evidently not least—no fewer than 24 phone numbers for my brother, Phil, versus six other Phils in my phone.

11-22-1963

Yesterday was the 62^nd anniversary of the last assassination of a U.S. President, John F. Kennedy. And that cataclysmic event in American history came two months after the 62^nd anniversary of the previous Presidential assassination—the September 1901 slaying of William McKinley in Buffalo.

There’s an extraordinary amount of effort and money devoted to stopping would-be Presidential assassins, but there’s also this intangible: luck.

For example, twice in September 1975, 17 days apart, two women in California tried to shoot Gerald Ford. The first was Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme, devoted follower of notorious cult leader/murderer Charles Manson. In Sacramento, she came within inches of Ford with a .45-caliber handgun but was restrained by a Secret Service agent.

The second, Sara Jane Moore, was stymied when a bystander grabbed her arm as she fired a second shot at Ford after he emerged from a San Francisco hotel.

Fromme, now 77, was released on parole in 2009; Moore was paroled from prison in 2007, a year after Ford’s death. She died two months ago, at 95. From The New York Times obituary on Moore:

“On Sept. 21, 1975, she was spotted with the gun by Secret Service agents in Palo Alto, Calif., as President Ford made an appearance at Stanford University. Agents seized the weapon but, after a brief evaluation of Ms. Moore, did not deem her a serious threat and released her. Hours later, she bought the .38-caliber gun from a dealer in Danville and fired it at the president the next day in San Francisco.”

And we all know how close 20-year-old Thomas Crooks came to assassinating Donald Trump 16 months ago in Pennsylvania. If he’d not turned his body this way, instead of that, Trump would’ve suffered substantially more than a bloody ear.

Wrigley Field: One Year Later

Fifty-one weeks ago, on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, I was at Wrigley Field in Chicago covering the Northwestern vs. Illinois football game for the Daily Herald while my daughter, Maggie Rose, did so for North By Northwest, a campus media outlet.

I shared my dad-daughter ruminations in this space the next weekend.

Yesterday, we returned to Wrigley Field and had even better seats: the centerfield bleachers, where we had a great view of so much of the action in a see-saw contest between Northwestern and Minnesota.

The thrilling 38-35 Wildcats win at the historic park, the home of the Chicago Cubs baseball team, was one of my top five experiences ever at an athletic event. Unlike a year ago, when press box decorum demanded I refrain from any outward rooting, I certainly partook in cheering this time—and never so vociferously as when the Golden Gophers kicker missed a potential game-tying field goal at the end:

What I’ve Been Reading:

Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, by James Nestor.

Extremely well written, the New York Times bestseller is not only eye-opening but mouth-closing, as Nestor underscores something I was previously clueless about: the superiority of breathing through your nose, versus via your mouth.

In short, if “keep your mouth shut” is the only thing someone remembers from this thoroughly researched, first-person journey toward better health, then that’s still a valuable takeaway.

What I’ve been watching:

Death by Lightning, a four-part Netflix series about James Garfield, our 20^th U.S. President, and his assassin, Charles Guiteau. Based on one of the best books I’ve ever read, Candice Millard’s Destiny of the Republic, the series is likewise excellent.

What I’ve been shooting:

Free throws, though only about once a week lately.

Since I began keeping track in March 2007, I’m up to 219,723 attempts that I’ve tabulated. This year’s total of 19,032 shots puts me on pace to exceed 20,000 for the sixth straight year. In 2025, I’ve made 87.9% of my 13,324 right-handed attempts and 81.0% of my 5,708 lefty shots, both slightly down from the past three years.

Meanwhile, my free-throw shooting godfather, Tom Steury, is still going strong in the Seattle area. Three times in the past week alone, Tom’s had streaks of at least 100 in a row. Overall, he’s making about 93% of his shots since he began tracking his efforts in 2005.

A little over two years ago, I wrote about Tom making his 1 millionth shot; he’s now closing in on 1.3 million makes, with daily sessions of 300 or 400 shots his norm.