My story could possibly be a little like your story. If that is the case, then it could do both of us some good for me to write this stuff down.
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
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
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
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
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
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
I have been blessed with good health and hardly ever get ill. Now that I am an old man, some things don’t work quite as good as they used to, but I really don’t have anything to complain about. I don’t have any of the chronic conditions that many of… Continue reading
My brother died of Covid December 29th, 2020. Because of the pandemic, we just held his memorial service back in Missouri last Thursday. Bill was 72, five years older than me. He was not in good health and resided in a nursing home. Yet, this disease that has taken hundreds… Continue reading
Today will be a departure from the COVID pandemic of disease, information, misinformation, varied projections, confusing advice, and conspiracy theories. Instead, I want to talk about my gallbladder. Hold on there, partner! Don’t skip to the next marvelous insight from the internet because much wisdom came from my encounter with… Continue reading
Ever notice how the cows all face the same direction in the pasture, but there is one that didn’t seem to get the memo and is separate from the herd doing his own thing? That’s me. I dislike housing tracts where the nearly identical a dwellings are crammed in close… Continue reading
A few years ago, when I was having some back pain, I got a call from my doctor’s office informing me of the results of my x-rays. The nurse who was probably not as old as some of my clothes, informed me I had osteo arthritis. I was shocked and… Continue reading
The Kansas City Chiefs won the Super Bowl last night after a fifty-year drought. But does it really matter? If I didn’t know better, I would think the NFL was enterprise invented by billionaires, lawyers, and modern-day gladiators. It is an American oddity. The world has soccer, known elsewhere as… Continue reading
The call comes.Everything changes.A flurry of activity ensues. Sunken cheeks.Is she aware?Is she there? Each breath scrutinized.Sit and watch.Was there a slight change? Nurses care.Hospice explains.We speak words of love, not knowing if they are heard. Even the aids kiss her forehead as tears roll down their faces.Our hearts melt.We love their love. Faith and… Continue reading
Have you ever surprised yourself? What I am really talking about is change. I usually fight change, but appreciate it in retrospect. I used to think that art museums and galleries were a waste of time. Now I am the one who who moves the slowest when we visit one.… Continue reading
All of the photos of are of the vintage garden apartment where I wrote this post. For the last couple of days, I have done pretty much nothing. It’s called a vacation, really, a three-day mini get-a-way. We came to place where there is nothing to do, and are staying in a… Continue reading
Boyd & Ava chillin’ in a chair I didn’t know if it would work. We had inherited two long-haired Chihuahuas. Due to no fault of their own, we were their fourth home. They are siblings, brother and sister. While they are off-the-charts cute, they are also needy, attention hogs, who… Continue reading
I was in a funk, terribly bored by the Internet, television, and movies; despising the regular patterns of my life. The more I dreamed of something that would bring a glimmer of life to my soul, the more unattainable it seemed. Fear was holding me tightly, even though I hardly… Continue reading
This post is part of a synchrobog in which we recount our favorite prank. The links to the other writer’s contributions are listed at the end of this post. After work, the kids and I met Patty at Giordano’s, a deep dish, Chicago-style pizza place in a neighboring suburb. Upon… Continue reading
I have to tell you what happened while we were in St. Paul enjoying Thanksgiving, our grandson’s birthday, and our daughter and son-in-law’s anniversary, all between last Wednesday and this Sunday. First, I asked a neighbor to take care of our crazed cat and watch over the place while we… Continue reading
I usually think about values in terms of my obituary, what I would want people to remember about me when I am gone. I would like them to say: He was real. Pretension makes me nauseous, and sometimes I am nauseating, but my goal is to be real. Being real gives other… Continue reading
After a couple (or was it three) very potent Margaritas and several hands of Rummy, someone said something that I found amusing at the time and I broke out in uncontrollable giggling. When I say giggling, I mean I sounded like a Junior High girl. And when I say uncontrollable, I… Continue reading
Transitions are always unsettling, filled with thoughts of excitement, fear, anticipation, and anxiety. It would be great if we could set our personal GPS and follow the directions to our desired location, never needing to redirect. But, alas, that is not at the way life plays out and it really… Continue reading
