For some reason, Santa was very late for my fifth Christmas. It’s not that there was too much snow; it seems it was one of those “green Christmases” in north-central Ohio, as I recall. Maybe it was because there wasn’t enough snow? Perhaps it was because I stayed up too…
Maybe it’s just a year of mounting frustration due to everything 2020 has thrown us, from COVID to politics, but the other day I came across a most distressing example of Christmas entitlement and its sad consequence. Three or four times in the past seven years during the Christmas season,…
Somewhere along the way, certainly in the last century, someone decided to add a sub-genre of music to the “Christmas/Holiday” category. It might be called “romance” or “love songs” or something like that. I won’t try to prove it statistically, but my hunch is that most new Christmas (or Holiday)…
Last week, I took a glance ahead at the calendar. December 2 stood out prominently. My father was born on that date in 1934. He would be 86 years old, had he survived to see the day arrive. It’s been sixteen months since we buried him in a plot in…
Aren’t you thankful you’re not a turkey living (for the moment!) on a turkey farm? Fortunately for them, I suppose, they’re clueless of their fate. Ever played the imagination game “What If…?” Ask yourself a series of questions and imagine the answers. Questions like: • “What if I were born…
My first bike appeared under (or near, I should say) the Christmas tree in 1965. A Western Flyer Sonic Flyer, it was a nice, shiny red traditional kind of bike—you know, typical design with a typical saddle kids in the mid-60s loved. I was thrilled with it and proud to…
I should have listened. I knew better, but thought I knew better. In June of 2017, I ventured out on my first multi-day backpacking trip. Not too many lengthy trails for such purposes are found within a 3-4 hour drive from home, but a good beginner trail is only a…
It doesn’t seem to matter where we’ve been, we’ve observed the phenomenon of people being drawn to the sun—whether for sunrise or sunset. Many years ago while living in Vermont, we vacationed in Bar Harbor, Maine, at the gateway to Acadia National Park in Mt. Desert Island. Cadillac Mountain rises…
“I can’t breathe!” We’ve heard it countless times in the past few months, and probably have become a bit weary of hearing it. Of course, the genesis of that lament comes from the back seat of a police car in Minneapolis. But that’s a discussion for another day. Maybe. Well,…
My wife gave me a very unique gift for my birthday this year. Essentially, it’s a glorified key chain that will never be used for keys. Instead, produced by a company called The Wander Club, the idea is to collect, not keys, but little engraved tokens commemorating places one has…
