At last the days are warming in the Mid-West. Its beginning to feel like spring. The buttercups are sprouting and a few are in bloom by the road. After breakfast at Taste of Paris Cafe on Sunday morning we traveled to Wheaton to see our children and grand children. To visit together on a…
I was not there. A prior commitment oblidged me to be in Chicago on Friday evening. At that time the grand opening of The Long Grove Confectionary store and the adjoining sister company, the Long Grove Coffee Company was held in splendid fashion by Towner Green. The weather gods smiled upon the event and…
Mid April. I anticipate with longer days warm weather will call forth the green of grass and the tender shoots of daffodils. This weekend was a setback. A mega storm of snow and ice swept across the plains state. Minnesota received fifteen inches in some parts. The Star Tribune called it a historic blizzard. …
I cannot imagine the headlines, if they should have had such a thing as a newspaper. More to the point the “news” was conveyed by word of mouth over the commercial sea lanes of the Mediterranean basin: Troy has fallen. After ten years of war, Priam’s great city is sacked by the Achaeans. That…
Achilles, like most people, has many values, which do not all fit together tidily in all circumstances. This would be a flaw, I suppose, if there were a better alternative, or if it were not so obviously the human lot. –excerpt The Anger of Achilles essay by C D C Reeve
A more intimate opportunity for philosophical “play” is offered at Taste-of-Paris on Thursday evenings. The setting could not be more perfect. A few of us meet in the dining room, find a place at the round table, which is under the scaled down model of the Eiffel Tower. Two to five individuals, friends, a…
Stopped in at the local CVS yesterday to purchase a birthday card. Walking with purpose to the greeting card display against the back wall, I passed a solitary individual who was busy stocking shelves who said “hello.” In the big, quiet store I chose a card with a superhero graphic on the front. Making…
There have been many. Yesterday, I challenged myself to remember the names of as many of my elementary teachers as I could. I remembered most of them, in order, from the first to the eighth grade. A majority are remembered with affection and gratitude. They gave an emotionally lost kid the gift of their…
Monday after Easter. Back into the trenches of life. To call it problem solving is an understatement. Circumstances develop, life itself demands particular “solutions” –or things fall apart, or so it seems. Easter is a story, a compact microcosm of ideas and emotions, a miniature of life itself. Betrayal, trial, abandonment, suffering and the…
Easter, April 1st, and my birthday. The sun rises brilliant, warm, and smooth jazz is playing inside at Starbucks. Easter is the day by which we all celebrate our good fortune to be alive. And it’s sheer good fortune, our number came up in the lottery of Nature. Sometimes things happen which remind us…
