Category Archives: Feature Columns

By Benjamin Custer
Texarkana Gazette (Published May 2011)

In a place frequented by deafening thunderstorms and crawling with venomous snakes and spiders, it does not take long for a guy from Southern California to toughen up.

A sunbathing snake nearly sank its fangs into my leg the other day while I was walking through the barn on the way to my house. Had I not jumped back at the last moment, I would have failed to avoid its defensive strike.

Though I’ve only lived in Texas a short time, this was not my first encounter with a serpent.

By Benjamin Custer
Texarkana Gazette (Published January 2011)

People used to savor their private lives. Now, they cannot display enough of them.

Not long ago, finding one’s self alone at home surfing the web on a Friday night would be disappointing. Now, many people prefer engrossing themselves in the interconnected-yet-isolating online world of social networking to a tangible social life.

Seemingly everyone and his mother (and in some cases, even his grandmother) have succumbed to the appeal of social networking. Websites such as Facebook, Myspace and Twitter seem to get as many hits as search engines such as Google and Yahoo.

By Benjamin Custer
Texarkana Gazette (Published August 2011)

Some of us are so focused on our problems we regularly fail to count our blessings.

There is often something to worry about, something to desire or something to regret.

The state of the economy seems to be the most pressing concern among Americans. The tentacles of the recession have reached the young and old, white- and blue-collar workers and everyone in between.

By Benjamin Custer
Texarkana Gazette (Published July 2011)

Luke Skywalker met his equal a little more than a decade ago, and it wasn’t Darth Vader—it was a boy wizard with a lightning-bolt-shaped scar.

The boys in my third-grade class would sooner have contemplated real-life Wookies than believe a book about a school of witchcraft and wizardry could prove as fascinating as the original “Star Wars” trilogy.

Friendships were forged through mutual obsession with the classic films, and lunchtimes were spent trading “Star Wars” cards and discussing our favorite Jedi. Posters of Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia adorned my walls, action figures lined my shelves and “The Empire Strikes Back” practically lived in my VCR.