Phather Phil’s Prayer

Today’s Guests

All Photos from the Meeting are Here

Upcoming events

Beer and Wine Tasting Social

There will be a Wine and Beer tasting event on Saturday, February 23^rd, 2019 at Diane and Patrick Arehart’s residence. You can taste wine, beer or both or just come to socialize.  Contact Diane Arehart (dla@arehart.com) or Beth Duncan (beth@lizardap.com) to sign up.

Upcoming Committee Meetings

Golf Committee will be meeting on Wednesday, February 20^th, 2019 at 6:00 pm at Buckeye Home Care located on Paragon Road.

Childhood Cancer will be meeting on Thursday March 14^th, 2019, at 6:30 at the Centerville Panera Bread.

Oratorical Contest was today (second and final week)

Liz Fultz, the chair of the Oratorical contest, introduced the participating students and described this annual event. This is the third year for Liz to chair this event. She would like to thank the content and timing judges for assisting with the event.

From Liz Fultz:

Today we have the second group of participants for the Margaret Barclay Memorial 2019 Optimist Oratorical Contest.  Since it was established in 1928, the Oratorical Contest has become the longest-running program sponsored by Optimists International.  This contest is named in honor of former Optimist member Margaret Barclay who passed away in 2010.   Margaret chaired this committee for many years.  She cared deeply about bringing out the best in kids and in living the Optimist Creed.  She was a most beloved member of our club, a past president and lived a life dedicated to helping others. Margaret Barclay’s accomplishments were vast including 40 years in public education, the last 27 in the Centerville Schools. She retired in 2000 as Principal at Magsig Middle School. It is a pleasure to see her memory continually being recognized in this way.

The Oratorical Contest is done in collaboration with Centerville Evening and South Metro Optimists, who also sponsor contests.  Mr. Roy Barclay, husband of Margaret, supports the contest by making an annual donation.  Thank you, Roy, for your ongoing contributions and support of this contest.

The rules were changed this year by Optimist International to make it co-ed instead of a boy group and a girl group.

https://centervillenoonoptimist.com/oratorical-contest/

Contestants deliver a four to five-minute speech.  One winner from each contest advances to the zone competition and then can advance to the finals at the district level.  Districts have the opportunity to provide a first-place scholarship of $2,500, a second-place scholarship of $1,500, and a third place scholarship of $1,000.

The 2019 topic “Is There a Fine Line Between Optimism and Reality?”.

To keep the judging fair, the names of the contestants were kept secret and we were not allowed to applaud the participants until all had presented. All of today’s students were from Centerville schools and were female.

Speaker A went first. She said that optimism and reality are not on opposite sides of the line but are interwoven. “Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence”, a quote from Helen Keller.

If you do the work in school, you will get that A, just being optimistic isn’t enough. Expectations in observing an event can change the perception of an event. Don’t be reckless with your optimism. If you don’t know how to ski, don’t start on the Diamond slope because reality still matters no matter how optimistic you are.

Speaker B was next. Imagine you have a hard head injury in a football game. The coach asks you what your name is and you don’t know it. You have been disconnected from reality. Optimists are fully aware of their reality. Optimists work hard to find nuggets of positivity in a difficult situation. Optimists value positivity and have created habits to stay happy. Sometimes an optimist blocks out the reality. A realist sees the worst in a situation. An optimist will look for ways to improve if they didn’t make it on a team, while a realist will complain about uncontrollable factors for why they didn’t make it.

Speaker C was next. Thomas Edison ignored the line between optimism and reality He ran his electric experiments more than 1000 times before succeeding with the electric light bulb. In the story of David vs Goliath, David’s optimism was important for giving him the strength to stand up against the Goliath with just a slingshot as a weapon.

She said she had practiced dance her entire life. She planned to be a primary dancer with the American Ballet Theater dance company. She had to quit dancing because of a disease she developed in her legs. Being an optimist, she started playing the violin again since she couldn’t dance anymore. She was very far behind the other students who had been in the symphony orchestra for several years already. She stayed optimistic and was able to catch up to the other musicians and play as well as the best players.

God has intertwined the line of optimism and reality, that weaves a beautiful tapestry of life. In conclusion she said abolish the line and make the impossible possible.

Speaker D was our final speaker. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Looking on the bright side of life can have a major impact on your life. Optimism can affect your life both physically and mentally. Optimists tend to live a longer, healthier life. Reality can be affected by optimism and make it better.

Being optimistic can change the reality of others around you. Use positivity to achieve goals. You are more likely to achieve goals when you are optimistic. When younger at a gymnastics competition, she was very nervous, but she was optimistic, and she overcame her nerves and took first place.

You must have a sense of reality while being optimistic. You still must try, learn and achieve to reach your goals. Firefighters in California are fighting numerous wild fires. They need both reality and optimism to put the fires out quickly and safely.

The relationship between optimism and reality require that you need to be realistic in your goals.

All four students did a fantastic job in both content and presentation. Only one moves forward and that is speaker D. You are welcome to go see her at the next round of the Oratorical contest at the library in a couple of weeks.

Birthdays

Membership Anniversaries

New Member Readings and Inductions

Sergeants at Arms

 Happy Bucks! 

No happy bucks this week.

Phather Phil’s Prayer

Today’s Guests

All Photos from the Meeting are Here

Flippin’ Awesome Awards Presentation

Donna Huss presented “Flippin’ Awesome” awards to Evelyn Griffin and Tom Novak for their support of the January 17^th 2019 NOW event. Evelyn produced a mailing from every individual that had a tree delivered during our tree lot sale. Tom completed a mailing to all of the current AOF (Avenue of Flags) subscribers. Both of these individuals went “Above and Beyond” to assist in making the NOW event the success it was. Thank you, again, to both of you!!

NOW is an acronym for “New Optimists Welcome”. Read more about it here. We will be having more NOW events this year.

Committee Announcements

Golf Committee: Next committee meeting will be Wednesday, February 20^th, 2019 at 6:00 pm at Buckeye Home Care located on Paragon Road.

PGI/PDP:  Myron will again be available before and after next week’s lunch meeting to sign-up or update member passports. Please make an effort to see Myron.

Childhood Cancer: Next committee meeting will be Thursday, February 7^th, 2019 at the Centerville Panera at 6:30pm. Their next meeting is March 14^th, 2019 (same time and location).

Social Committee: there will be a Wine and Beer tasting event on Saturday, February 23^rd, 2019 at Diane and Patrick Arehart’s residence. You can try both wine and beer, or just one (or neither, there will be lots of food). More details will follow.

Oratorical Contest was today.

Liz Fultz, the chair of the Oratorical contest, introduced the participating students and described this annual event. This is the third year for Liz to chair this event. She would like to thank the content and timing judges for assisting with the event.

From Liz Fultz:

February 5^th 2019 is the first day of the Margaret Barclay Memorial 2019 Optimist Oratorical Contest.  Since it was established in 1928, the Oratorical Contest has become the longest-running program sponsored by Optimists International.  This contest is named in honor of former Optimist member Margaret Barclay who passed away in 2010.   Margaret chaired this committee for many years.  She cared deeply about bringing out the best in kids and in living the Optimist Creed.  She was a most beloved member of our club, a past president and lived a life dedicated to helping others. Margaret Barclay’s accomplishments were vast including 40 years in public education, the last 27 in the Centerville Schools. She retired in 2000 as Principal at Magsig Middle School. It is a pleasure to see her memory continually being recognized in this way.

The Oratorical Contest is done in collaboration with Centerville Evening and South Metro Optimists, who also sponsor contests.  Mr. Roy Barclay, husband of Margaret, supports the contest by making an annual donation.  Thank you, Roy, for your ongoing contributions and support of this contest.

https://centervillenoonoptimist.com/oratorical-contest/

Contestants deliver a four to five minute speech.  One winner from each contest advances to the zone competition and then can advance to the finals at the district level.  Districts have the opportunity to provide a first place scholarship of $2,500, a second place scholarship of $1,500, and a third place scholarship of $1,000.

The 2019 topic “Is There a Fine Line Between Optimism and Reality?”.

To keep the judging fair, the names of the contestants were kept secret and we were not allowed to applaud the participants until all had presented.

This contest will be held at our lunch this week and next. This week all four students are from Incarnation School. Next week there will be 3 from Centerville middle schools and another from Incarnation School.

Today, the first three participants were female and the final a male.

Speaker A went first. She argued that there is a fine line between optimism and reality. She reflected on fictional characters to demonstrate this line. The daily news has been very negative and she has had many deaths in her family recently. Keeping optimistic helps to get through life’s challenges. “Through the darkness is how we find the light.”

Speaker B was next. Thomas Jefferson said, “Nothing can stop a positive man from doing anything he wants to do.” Navy Seals use active optimism. She said the optimist in her is helping her recover from a recent concussion. The Navy Seals are not successful from luck, but from preparation and a positive optimism. Ghandi, Jefferson and Ben Carson all used a positive mental attitude to reach their goals.

Speaker C was next. She quoted Mary Lou Retton, “Optimism is a happiness magnet. If you stay positive, good things and good people will be drawn to you.” Being optimistic is a magnet for success. The fine line lies between the meaning of the two terms optimism and reality. The appearance of reality is affected by whether you choose an optimistic or pessimistic outlook. Hope and optimism improves reality. She shared a story of how her sports team stayed optimistic on a very hot day to come back and win a match.

Speaker D was our final speaker. Steve Jobs quoted, “You cannot connect the dots moving forward, only by looking back.” Optimism allows you to work on the future dots with the plan that they will connect. Optimists expect good from reality and live a life being positive. You want your reality to be the best it can be. Optimism is a mindset to make tasks in life easier. There is a fine line and hopefully your dots will be connected in a positive way.

All four students did a fantastic job in both content and presentation. Only one moves forward and that is speaker C. You are welcome to go see her at the next round of the Oratorical contest at the library in a couple of weeks.

Birthdays

Membership Anniversaries

New Member Readings and Inductions

Due to the time needed for Boys and Girls Oratorical Contests, we did not do any new reading nor inductions this week.

Sergeants at Arms

No time for sergeants this week.

 Happy Bucks! 

No time for Happy Bucks this week.