Too Late? Regrets?

I was reminded this week that we often wait too long to do the right things. Finally, Orestes "Minnie" Minoso was selected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown by the Veterans' Committee. By most accounts, his inclusion was long overdue. It wasn't just his playing ability. After all, how many players can you name who held on to a fly ball with a fan spilling a beer on his head????? No, seriously, Minoso was a gifted all-round player. He could hit, run the bases like few others could ("The Cuban Comet"), and was a demon on defense. On top of that, he overcame or at least had to deal with the prejudice and discrimination of being a black player (from Cuba). The only issue I have with Minoso's induction is what took so long? He died six or seven years ago. Why couldn't the powers that be in Cooperstown give this man his just reward while he was alive and could enjoy/relish it? Better late than never? I don't know. The same was done at one of the colleges where I teach. Founded in 1921, it was called Flint Jr. College or Flint Community College or some variant of the two for more than forty years. Over the decades, Charles Stewart Mott (at his death, the largest single owner of General Motors stock, said to be worth $800 million at the time) donated tens of millions of dollars and land to the school. He even gave the college $5 million to erect a building to celebrate his parents'50th anniversary. Finally, in the late '60s, the college changed its name--to Genessee Community College. Mott died in 1973. Several months after his death, after!, the school became C.S. Mott Community College. Why the wait? What would have been wrong with naming it Mott CC while he was alive, to honor him, to show the appreciation he deserved? Better late tha never? I don't know. I can't be too critical of such instances, I guess. How many people died without me adequately expressing my gratitude for the importance they played in my life? There's no excuse, not really. For a while I tried, "Life just got in the way." I suppose that worked for a while, but now find it pretty lame. About 20 years ago, I began to reconnect with some of my college professors, three or four who were were still alive. We still correspond several times a year with e-mails. (Yes, I benefit, too, always getting excited to receive an e-mail from one of "the gods.") The same for my college coach. For 30 years or so, there was little contact between us. At his retirement celebration we also reconnected. He gave me his e-mail address, but he's not very good with e-mails so, again, mostly silence. Finally, at the urgings of some of my teammates, I reached out with phone call some time back. Now, I make a point to call every three months or so. I hope and assume they know why I've made the effort. I try not to be sappy and maudlin, falling all over myself to show my appreciation. Just keeping in contact, I hope, is enough. It's a long, too long, list of people now gone who I'm not sure I adequately thanked. Now it's too late. Shame on me. I suppose I can come up with reasons, but none are really legitimate. Better late than never doesn't work with them--they are gone. While I'm at it, let me touch upon a related issue. Why don't we name more things--parks, schools, etc.--after more people deserving of being honored? I suppose an argument can be made for some place names stemming from plants/trees (Oak Valley to name a local school), geographical features (Spring Mills, another local), and even directions (Southwestern, several in the state). But why not ditch those and replace them with the names of people who made significant contributions to our lives, our society, our country? (OK, in this age of wokeness and its opaque sense of history, this might be problematic.) I've always been stunned thea there are only two high schools in the state of Michigan named after Abraham Lincoln, two out of almost 2,000! As far as I know, only one each is named after George Washington, Martin Luther King, Thomas Jefferson, and the like. (Yes, I'm ignoring that historical opaqueness of the wokesters.) Again, there are dozens that are named after directions! Names don't have to be national, but surely state and even more local would be fitting. Doing such would accomplish several things. It would express appreciation for the significant contributions people have made. It shows we value important contributions and the people who made them. It also demonstrates to those living heroes that we are grateful for what they have done. And, if done properly, that is, we identify those whose names grace our buildings and other places, it can tie people with the history of a city, state , or other region. (One local school district did just that, naming its three junior highs Mason, Pierce, and Crary. But then it dropped the ball. In my history classes, I often ask students where they attended high school. If from this school district, I ask them if they know who Mason, Pierce, and Crary were or, for that matter, who Kettering and Mott were, after whom the district's high schools are named. They almost always have no idea.) Perhaps I ask too much.