My mother passed away this evening. She was nearly 89 and hopelessly confused by dementia. Several years back, I wrote the following letter at Christmas. I was happy with it then and I'm especially glad I said the things I said then, while she was still pretty sharp. (By way of… Read full post »

When I was a boy, in 1950’s Salem, Oregon, my father was a chief petty officer working at the local Naval Reserve Training Center. Every Thursday afternoon he would come home, change out of his everyday khaki uniform and put on his dress blue uniform and return to work after dinner… Read full post »

The road unrolls like an asphalt ribbon, my legs pump like happy pistons against the pedals. Hugging the shoulder just barely on the road as cars and trucks pass, some singly, others in strings of two, three, or four. My eyes study the road on constant alert for the rim bending… Read full post »

You’re finally out of high school, proving to your mother that no matter how much pot you smoked, or how many classes you cut, you still couldn’t screw up badly enough to flunk out. The tragedy is that it will take you 10 long difficult years to return to school and… Read full post »

 Yesterday was April 20th, or 4-20 which is celebrated by some as national marijuana day. NPR took a fantasy look at what the US might be like if pot were legalized. The link is below, have a listen.

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Part 1 of this is here.

Lacking television for diversion, I found that I could watch the antics of our three hens for an equivalent level of amusement. The hens lived in a large run that I’d created in the back corner of our yard. It was about… Read full post »

In the late 70’s we were living a pretty minimalist existence in the “bad” part of town. This is to say we lived among other poor people. Chas was an unemployed artist living with his girlfriend Betty who gardened and raised a goat for milk and chickens for eggs. Rocky lived… Read full post »

I have no shortage of favorite movies but my favorite one of all time has to be "The Best Years of Our Lives." Sam Goldwyn did a masterful job of gauging the shift in the country’s mood to post war reflection and, with William Wyler directing, portrayed it using three veterans… Read full post »

1. I love to travel. Especially open ended travel with no set destination where you just follow your nose to interesting opportunities.

2. I was a newspaper boy for four years and I really like the crisp still air at 4:30 AM. Getting up early is a treat. I also worked… Read full post »