It would be great if life were all sunshine and rainbows, but it is not. While I enjoy being around upbeat people, I also need to be around some folks who are real and admit they struggle with things like I do. Their honesty lets me know I am not… Continue reading
The county fair is a rite of passage for the summer, and I can’t think of anything that is more Americana. It harkens back to a day when counties were predominantly rural. Local farmers brought their very best calves, pigs, and chickens to be judged. Others showcased their produce or… Continue reading
These words sound like an oxymoron. How can you give what you did not receive? To understand, we need to look back into our formative years. Our parents got some things right, but they also got some things wrong. There were gaps in our parenting, maybe some gaping holes. Maybe… Continue reading
I am a southerner at heart. Maybe, even a beach bum. Though we have spent most of our lives in northwestern Missouri, central Illinois, and especially northeastern Illinois, near Lake Michigan on the Wisconsin state line, we love the south and have visited many times. Now we live here. Don’t… Continue reading
Keeping our lives balanced is a bit like standing on one foot (which requires balance of a different kind). It’s hard to do for very long. Life throws things at us that draw our attention away from the safeguards and healthy habits that we build into our lives. When things… Continue reading
Two very strange things happened in the last few days. A Democratic Socialist was sworn in as mayor of New York City and the United States invaded another sovereign nation capturing its leader to face justice in the U.S. These are unusual events to say the least and they are… Continue reading
Here it is: the big flip of the page to 2026. It’s that golden opportunity to reflect on 2025 and to aspire for a better 2026. The trick is combining those noble aspirations with the crush of reality for a hopeful way forward. But let’s be honest, somewhere about mid-January… Continue reading
Since this post seemed to several people last year, I am reposting it here. Christmas 1981 The news hit us hard. Everything in our busy lives faded from our minds as our thoughts were consumed with one new haunting fact. Patty had a large tumor that required a hysterectomy. She was… Continue reading
We just returned home from spending a weekend in Nashville, our third trip, but our first concert. I am not a big city guy, but I like to go and see the things the city offers and then head back to my cozy home in the Cumberlands of East Tennessee.… Continue reading
It was a pretty fall day, and I had made a vow to myself and my wife to get out and explore our new home, i.e., the Cumberland Mountains. Somewhere in my internet searches for interesting attractions, I ran across Elrod Falls. It was forty-two miles away. Was it worth… Continue reading
By the time you read this I suspect that a short-term compromise has finally been reached to fund the government. But as I write, the federal government has been shut down for Forty-four days. It is the longest shutdown in history. Unfortunately, it is not an isolated event, but it is… Continue reading
I am not from here. About a quarter of my life was spent in northwest Missouri having grown up in St. Joseph. After that we moved to a bedroom town near Kansas City, Missouri (and I can’t help but remain a Chiefs’ fan). Lastly, we wound up in Illinois. First… Continue reading
I know I have been writing a lot about my health issues lately. But writers often write about something in the realm of their personal experience. Health issues have been an unexpected part of my personal experience lately, first orthopedic and then cardiac. I have enjoyed a remarkable lack of… Continue reading
I’m still waiting to get an appointment with a cardiologist. It has been three weeks after I was told that I have some real issues in that department. Certainly, there are some good things about medical care in this country. We probably have some of the best and most advanced… Continue reading
This post is a bit self-indulgent, but I needed to write it for me (and maybe for you or someone else who reads it.) I am seventy-one years old and have been blessed with good health. Finally, the “check engine” light came on. Chronic joint and muscle pain have been… Continue reading
There must be a little dirt in my blood, more specially, clay. It sounds like a cardiovascular nightmare, but the point is I have always liked dirt track racing. When I was a kid, my parents frequented the local track at a nearby town in Northwest Missouri. When we moved… Continue reading
I got my first Tennessee speeding ticket yesterday. I was doing 73 in a 55 zone on 25E south of town. It’s my wife’s fault for buying a red car. I like my seat back and my steering wheel low. Unfortunately, the wheel position obscured the speedometer. On my car… Continue reading
Sometimes writers change things, like names and details. They do it to keep from offending people and to keep from being sued. Occasionally, it is essentially to protect the guilty. I am going to tell you a story that is true in its intent, but not in its details. A… Continue reading
This post is intended for both local readers and those who live elsewhere. Barn at the end of my street I have lived in Tennessee a little over two months. That’s not very long, especially since so many people I have talked to have lived here all their life. But… Continue reading
Sometimes it seems like life never changes. Each new day is eerily like the one before. But occasionally, there is a huge change, and we know it is the beginning of a whole new chapter. There are a lot of pages in a book, but only a few chapters and you… Continue reading
That’s what my physical therapist asked me the other day. I think most of you know we have moved from Northeastern Illinois to Northeastern Tennessee. It took a toll. Here is my best advice: Don’t. Don’t move unless you have really good reasons to do so. You cannot imagine everything… Continue reading
I literally hobbled into the hotel in Lafayette, Indianna at midnight. We had to be out of our old home and wanted to get a few miles down the road toward our new home. We never dreamed we would be so late. There we were nearly 200 miles from our… Continue reading
When I let one of our neighbors know we were moving, he replied,” That’s one of the biggest pains there is.” I replied, “I am looking forward to it, but then we have lived in this house for twenty-seven years, so maybe I forgot what it is like.” That is one of the most profound things I have ever uttered. Continue reading
Music is an important part of my life. I like listening to it, watching it being played, and playing along with it; sometimes loud. It is a language of the soul beyond words, even poetry. It gets us moving, thinking, and most of all, feeling. It takes us back to… Continue reading
Twenty-seven years ago, we needed to relocate to accommodate my mother-in-law who was moving in with us. By then we had lived in the far north suburbs of Chicago for about five years. We had narrowed down our potential home to one of three options. I am sitting in the… Continue reading
Kenosha, Wisconsin is ten minutes from our home in Winthrop Harbor, Illinois. Since Winthrop Harbor is a bedroom town to Chicago, it has limited offerings for shopping and dining. So, Kenosha has been “our city” for nearly thirty years. Kenosha (“Keno”) was a manufacturing and shipping center and, in the… Continue reading
About two and half years ago our long-haired Chihuahua died. He was an incredibly sweet little guy. He defied the breed stereotype by being a mellow cuddler who loved belly rubs. I never cared for small dogs, until we got him. I wound up loving him more than any dog… Continue reading
I am not a game person. They seem like a waste of mental energy and pointless competition. But I have some exceptions. I like the interaction that games encourage. You get to let your hair down and have some fun with people. Scrabble has some appeal because at least you… Continue reading
One of the most dangerous things in life is having nothing to do. I bring up the topic because we are in a bit of a waiting period right now. We have been talking about moving south for several years, but we never found anything that we both liked and… Continue reading
Hi there. This post is a little different. I am tipping my hand a bit by letting you know how I feel about something of which there are serious differences of opinion. These days most everything has been made political with extreme opinions ruling the day. Your civil, well-reasoned comments… Continue reading
That’s a photo of my new baby. I have four others. So, you must think I am a good guitarist or play in a band. Nope. I just play for me. However, it would be fun to play in a band. In a sense I do play in a band… Continue reading
This post has nothing to do with atmospheric conditions or skin care. It is a reflection about our trips around the sun. Tomorrow I will celebrate 71 of them. I am not fishing for birthday wishes of happiness and joy (though always appreciated). Rather, I am using it as an… Continue reading
I had planned to write a tribute to my Chiefs while basking in the warm glow of victory. Instead, I am writing to process my grief. I never really thought about the Chiefs losing after their victorious season of generally doing just enough to win game after game. I didn’t… Continue reading
It’s time for us to do a final clean out of our house before we meet with our realtor March 1st and put our home of twenty-five years on the market in early April. Fortunately, we also did some of this last fall knowing this time was coming. We have gotten… Continue reading
You get off to such a fine start. With Thanksgiving and Christmas, that first snowfall is a work of art. But you overstay your welcome as your beauty quickly fades into a massive filthy slushy and white glaze of salt. Your refreshing chill turns bitter, and you must be removed,… Continue reading
I watched the inauguration of President Trump, and I am brimming with reaction, but I am not going to write about it. If I did, a bunch of you would brand me as an enemy or, at least, a poor, misguided soul. You would probably delete me as a Facebook… Continue reading
I remember his presidency: his big toothy grin, his common man persona, and his background as a naval officer and peanut farmer. He is generally hailed for his character and his post-presidency, even though most thought his years as president were not so great. I don’t see how we can… Continue reading
If necessity is the mother of invention, then desperation is the mother of writing. The desperation is the need to understand our own hearts and minds. Stating things so another can understand is a key component of our own understanding. That’s the cathartic element of writing non-fiction. The human spirit… Continue reading
Welcome to day one of 2025. Every day of this entire year is “yet to be determined.” I have a sense of excitement at the beginning of every year. There are new things I want to explore, new disciplines I want to acquire, and some crappy things I want to… Continue reading
Christmas 1981 The news hit us hard. Everything in our busy lives faded from our minds as our thoughts were consumed with one new haunting fact. Patty had a large tumor that required a hysterectomy. She was twenty-five. We got married very young. Patty was only eighteen. I was all… Continue reading
I have been wanting to write about this for so long that I am now only two months from turning 7 – One. I remember the milestone birthdays, 40, 50, 60, 70, especially seventy, though 50 was interesting, since it was at Chucky Cheese. When I was a kid, if… Continue reading
About 300,000 people move out of Illinois every year, for a net loss of 116,000. We are moving out of Illinois. About 226, 000 people move to Tennessee every year. The net gain is 43,000. We are moving to Tennessee. I have a few people to “blame” for this: My… Continue reading
When I pray and when I think, I tend to labor over what is wrong, what needs to be fixed. These are the black specks on the blank piece of white paper. I focus on what’s wrong with other people and especially what’s wrong with me, and, of course, what’s… Continue reading
It is so easy to enumerate what I am done with when it comes to religion. It is profoundly more difficult to figure out what to hang onto. I feel like I should occasionally ask myself that question to see if I am total heretic or just a free spirit. … Continue reading
I feel like I need to write a disclaimer every time I write a post that is critical of the institutional church. I write about my experience over several decades, both very much inside the church and outside of it. I am not mad at anybody. There are no “sour… Continue reading
This is one of the easiest and most cathartic posts I have ever written. It’s easy because I can clearly catalog the characteristics of evangelical religion that are distasteful to me. Since I write this at the peak fervor of our presidential campaign, Evangelical entanglement with politics immediately comes to… Continue reading
It has been a long while since I have posted here and I have missed it. I realize that my readers come from different perspectives and some of the posts I put up are not exactly their cup of tea. A long time ago, I went through my social media… Continue reading
Finally, a little time to think, and pray. God made an unassuming entrance into our little world. The creator became the creation. You would think his entrance would have been grandiose. Instead, it was humiliating. He was born into a blue color, working class family. It was a really bad… Continue reading
He was a comedian that played a teacher on a TV show whose character went on tirade about corruption in the country’s government. The tirade went viral on social media, and he was elected president of the country. That was a TV show. Now that same actor/comedian is the actual… Continue reading
John 20-21 Each mealtime has a special feeling to it. Breakfast is refreshing because it has been a long time since dinner. In our day, many people skip it or eat a pop tart on the way to work. Almost never does someone fix breakfast for you. So, when we have… Continue reading
