I am entranced by James Kavanaugh poems. I received a beautiful book of his poems, There Are Men Too Gentle To Live Among Wolves, for my birthday. Every poem is a collection of sensibility that resonates with me. The poems are interleaved with pen and ink drawing of trees with bare branches. One of…
Dreams, we all have them. They come as the mind moves from deep sleep to REM sleep in the nether world before waking. Most dreams evaporate from memory within moments of rising from sleep. A few linger in memory, a haunting message that demands attention. Nietzsche recounts such a dream. His character Zarathustra stands…
Last night a few of us conversed about music. I do not know anyone who does not depend upon music as a lifeline to emotional stability. Of course many do not, but I do not move in those circles. Music is the analog to life, life which is a river, a movement of always…
Guilty, guilty as charged. Along with others of my Baby Boomer generation I too have concluded that the members of the Millennial generation are unsuitable for hire. Sometimes exigencies of circumstance do result in a business relationship, then one must be prepared for inordinate commitment to parent-like support, to the kind of patience which…
I have little to say this morning. Chicago has a new Mayor. Much is made in the press about the first female black person to be elected Mayor, Lori Lightfoot. What is left unsaid, the thundering silence from the press reports is that it matters little who is elected, their racial heritage or their…
Yesterday was April Fool’s. Here I am among fools, myself one of many. That is the straight-up assessment of life that makes the most sense. And why not? I celebrated my 70th birthday yesterday, with the help of my family. My wife offered the most assistance with a really good meal at a favorite…
For all things are baptized at the font of eternity, and beyond good and evil; good and evil themselves, however, are but fugitive shadows and damp afflictions and passing clouds. Truly, it is a blessing and not a blasphemy When I teach that ‘above all things there stands the heaven of chance, the heaven…
Nietzsche’s dream-vision tale concludes. His spokesman Zarathustra comes upon a young shepherd lying across the mountain path in agony. A dog howls mournfully as a Greek chorus would add commentary to a tragedian performance. The narrator does not know if he is awake or if this is a dream. And is there a difference?…
Yesterday while at lunch I spoke with a friend. He told a story of an exchange with a Facebook acquaintance. His interlocutor sent a list of common ethical principles held between varieties of religious traditions. Conspicuously missing was that of the atheist position. Naturally my friend composed his version of the common ground that…
Man, however is the most courageous animal: thereby he has overcome every animal. With sound of triumph he has overcome every pain; human pain, however, is the sorest pain. Courage slays also vertigo at abysses; and where does not man stand at abysses! Is not seeing itself seeing abysses? Courage is the best slayer;…
