Yesterday was my birthday. Yes I know, April 1st is the day set aside so that everyone can play the jokester if they desire. That fits my temperament. Life is highly improbable, unlikely, fragile and thus is suitable material for ironic humor. What are the odds that I am here, that I continue to…
Rain had fallen all day. At dusk I had just turned on the ignition; the motor came to life along with the radio. In reverse, I slowly backed the few feet toward the road, half listening. The announcer said that the president was about to hold a press conference on the covid-19 crisis. By…
To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost. — Gustave Flaubert I have been a fan of “good quotes” for many years. At the prompting of a professor in grad school I began writing in a pocket-sized notebook memorable lines discovered…
Teachingis a kind of learning,much like loving,mutual goings-on,mutual forbearance,life itself, you might say. But how shall I improvethe swiftly-dimming hour?I shall deteriorate amid bucolic dreamsand gather in my fate.There’s lots worse ways than that. Alas,some goodbyes are like death;they bring the heart to earthand teach it how to die. Excerpt, Farewell to Teaching By…
Shortly we will depart Galena. A few hours of driving and we will be home again in Batavia. We take leave of Galena but our few days here have given us memories enough for many days and hours of satisfied reflection upon the people that we met, and all that we learned. The last…
I believe human freedom is narrowly circumscribed, channeled, confined by genetic inheritance, by the resources available for clothing, shelter, nourishment, safety, and above all shaped — by the values absorbed from the birth family, and mores of the zeitgeist into which I was born. None of these factors were and are, within my discretion….
The radio awakened me at 6AM, my usual rising time. Aware that if I lay there just a few more seconds I’d get additional rest before waking to the music again. Or I could go ahead and get up, and gain the 20 minutes of reading and writing time here at Starbucks. Either way,…
Monday is not a celebrated day of the week. For a many of us Monday signals a return to the responsibility, evaluation, tension of a competitive work place. Who looks forward to Monday? This Monday morning, I have promise of an answer to a conundrum which I have pondered for many years. Raised in…
There exists a creature that is perfectly harmless; when it passes before your eyes, you hardly notice it and immediately forget it again. But as soon as it somehow, invisibly, gets into your ears, it begins to develop, it hatches, and cases have been known where it has penetrated into the brain and flourished…
There are no longer “dancers,” the possessed. The cleavage of men into actor and spectators is the central fact of our time. We are obsessed with heroes who live for us and whom we punish. If all radios and televisions were deprived of their sources of power, all books and paintings burned tomorrow, all…
