View From Here

Life is experience. Plain and simple. We breathe in and exhale. Our bodies survive moment to moment, longer spans stretching into decades and many of those. We smile and frown. We feel hope and dread. We are happy at times and sad at other times. Elated now and again. Dashed in spirit also now and again. With each experience we learn something. Know something. We even piece some of these together with other groups of experiences, and voila! We discover yet more meanings, or at least, the possibilities of more meanings. Yes. We experience. We learn. We come to know. And yet, when honesty and openness are allowed to persist side by side, we know that we know very little. Much is yet unknown. Surprisingly, I know some things you do not. You know some things I do not. Whole groups of people feel this same distance. Nations even. Age groups, too. Genders. And a host of combinations of those selectors. The unknown. Knowing the unknown. Being aware that we have imperfect knowledge of li...

Worrying Seniors : all of us rely on Social Security and Medicare. Almost all of us. That’s why politicians and their party manipulators claim that Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are all deficit producers and are on the chopping block. This is not true, however, and is the face of public farce writ large. Future of Social Security. It pays its own way. The FICA ‘tax’ system is really a premium payment system. Both the employer and employee pay their share of this premium. The revenues are accepted by the federal government but kept separate from general tax revenues. The Social Security premium dollars are used as needed to support ongoing retiree payments of covered individuals as they age into active status in the system. Congress sees the huge bundles of money in the deposit system, then borrows it to fund the national debt. They pay a modicum of interest for this privilege, certainly not as much as the system could earn if they lent their cash reserves to banks and other ...

As I write these words, they sound in my head. There is a voice attached to them. It is my voice, or the voice I imagine having. Hearing my own voice on a tape recording always stuns me; that can’t be how I sound. But it is. To others. Just not to me. Anyway, the voice is an almost-hearing thing. I hear myself speak the words I write. Do you? And when I read someone else’s words, I hear a voice. Of course, it is an imagined voice because I don’t know what the author’s voice sounds like. But there it is, it is a word read but also ‘heard’. At a public reading the other day, I warned the audience that I write to be read, not heard. And so how my sounds are experienced by others is likely much different than what I have written and emoted. Similarly, each of us has a point of view. We speak it. We write it. We behave in the real world based on what our points of view are. We each have a voice. That same public reading the other day impressed on me how we are surrounded by so many ...

Words. Have meaning. Have presence. Have symbolism. Have will-o-the-wisp intonations. Of intentions, purpose and so many more what-nots. Engaged is such a word. It means what? I think it means involved, deeply and structurally involved with whatever. Is a person engaged in their tasks, their career, their family, their neighborhood, their community? Is he or she so connected with those they define the person? Is ‘engage’ a term that has dual meaning? Going forward and backward? Or is it simpler than that? And then, of course, what makes any one word mean any one thing? To expand that meaning requires what power to make it happen? What is the transforming power? Sometimes writing this blog is as easy as pie. Logic drives the conversation. Words appear and string into sentences and paragraphs. Meaning of those words, taken together, grows and becomes the purpose of the written piece. But was that purpose, that message, clear from the start of the writing process? Doubtful. Life...

Little white lines. Dotted lines. Curbs. Berms. Road ruts. Doorways and walls. Ceilings and floors. We have limits set for us. Here we are to go. There we dare not go. Repercussions await veering from demarcations. We know where they are. We know what they are. We don’t always agree with them. We do not always obey. “Staying in your lane is almost a mantra. Stick to your own business. These premises are off limits. Think what you will but keep it to yourself.” These and many other exhortations are commonplace. They are set on limiting our movement, actions and thoughts. In many instances they do. Many will obey the signals and behave as expected. Others will not. Public order is good for all of us. Breakaway behavior, however, has its perils. And positives. Doing the unexpected or forbidden, often uncovers startling truths that the rest of us benefit from knowing. The benefit may be in the form of an invention that revolutionizes our daily lives. The old demarcations may be o...

Political Campaigns : the season is upon us. Every two years we suffer through political campaigns as state legislatures, town councils, and federal offices are refilling their elected offices. The on and off cycles give some variation of themes and rank of power, but elections they remain. Each to be weathered and survived. The voter is presented with much information. Most of that information is nonsense flummery. It means nothing. It is for appearances. It is an attempt to attract your emotions, to lure you into supporting one candidate over another. This presentation, however, is fabricated nonsense. It is mostly downright false. It seems to get worse each cycle. Because the con works. For others it sickens and discourages their participation in the process. In that the con continues to do its job. In spite of all this, we voters hold the power to change the nation, state or town. It is up to us to know the issues, research the truth so we can also recognize the false blather. ...

Settling into old age, that is. And yes, one not only does this, but it is also automatic. You don’t have to make a conscious decision, but best you do when your thinking catches up with your doing. When you realize you have done this, several things happen quickly. First, you appreciate being retired and having the ability of pretty much spending your time the way you want to. Second, when what you spend your time doing becomes onerous, you realize you don’t have to do it. That makes it possible to rethink your commitment to the thing you are doing. Most of the time you recommit to it, and all is happiness. On the other hand, should you conclude that you need to divest yourself of the onerous task, this can be complicated and trying. Third, when # two, above, turns out badly, you discover that others will help you keep your focus on doing the things that make sense and satisfy you, and getting rid of the things you truly don’t need to be doing. Besides, if you don’t do that, y...

I have seen several eclipses in my lifetime. At 80, you would think so. Lunar and solar eclipses are very different and provide an interesting perspective on things. Lunar eclipses, of course during the daytime, are not very visible. At night they are but make an often moonless night just like another one. Solar eclipses, however, are stunning if they are near total. In Chicago, this week’s eclipse was about 94% at 2:07 pm. Wow! Streetlights came on. Although still sunny and shadows were still cast around buildings, people and cars, the light was dim. Shrouded was the feeling that came over me. Shrouded, darkened but not dark. Recovery from the eclipse was as slow as its approach. Crazy experience. Very odd. Noticeably so. And yet we knew it was coming, knew when it would occur, and even the percentage of totality. Still, our imaginations taunted us to think what it would be like. I did. But I was not prepared for what happened. I am glad I was home to witness this eclipse. Retir...

I read an internet article on what people regret as they lay dying. The most common theme is -Live life that is true to the self, not other people’s expectations. That’s it. Wondering what this could mean for anyone living in this manner, I see two opposites. One is freedom of exploring life fully and becoming more natural and fulfilled. The opposite is a selfish boor, who takes from others rather than giving. And that leads me to what I would say of my regret – not giving more to others. My career took off when I spent more time helping others than trying to earn more for myself and family. The income race is more an ego thing than a practical question of affordability. I can certainly say I was in that race, but one day, I became fascinated in changing things for the better, helping others become more of the who they could be. There was no day in particular, or date, that I am aware of making this change. It just happened. Years later I could see that I was happy doing the work...

Tom Sherlock died on Wednesday, April 3rd. He was 65 years old and did not survive a heart surgery. That was his unexpected end and sad enough. But there is more to his story. Tom joined Dan Schuyler and George Safford to create what became the Village Chronicles, a weekly newspaper serving Warrenville, Illinois. That paper expanded to serve Winfield and then West Chicago. The paper published for eight years and built a good reputation for itself. Tom served the paper in several ways. He was our information technology guru, provided hardware and software to support the paper's operations. He was our sole bookkeeper, accountant and financial manager. He designed our distribution process and provided office space for meetings and layout and typesetting. His efforts supported the work of 32 volunteers who wrote and reported on the communities we served.  The newspaper broke even financially most of the time, but it was a struggle. Tom managed to find money to keep the newspaper afloat...

Feeling good. The sense of knowing myself. Being confident of understanding my surroundings. Not feeling disconnected, alone. Being part of the whole yet able to discern meaning. More. Even more to the significance of fulfillment. Helping another person feel the same way. Spotting the look of knowing in the eyes of the other. They just got something, know what it means. What did I do to make that happen? Anything?  Teachers know this feeling. They recognize the spark of cognition. The how it is done seems like magic. Not always known by the teacher. Intended yes, but not always known. There is something of a miracle present, not something controllable. The setting has to be right. The student/recipient has to have a frame of mind amenable for receiving ideas or at least the stimulus of an idea. The rest belongs to the student. He/she is the thinker, the creator of the idea. It is theirs, and they know it. Perhaps the idea is the cognition? Or maybe the knowing of its creation i...

The dishwasher is not full but clean silverware is getting scarce. Glasses, too, are running low. Best to run the machine now and have an empty, clean dishwasher later in the day. Same with garbage bins. Filling up yet still some squashability to make more room. Perhaps consider filling it the rest of the way with small contributions from other waste cans scattered around the house? Then, take out the larger bag and start fresh with a new empty bag. Laundry is another routine that comes and goes. Well, it is always coming, isn’t it? Always a pair of used socks, underwear, shirts and utility rags. Towels, too. Then pants and sweatshirts and pants. The load gathers. Sometimes it fills full before the week is out, so an extra load is needed, especially to clean the towels. And the mail. Slogs of it, mostly ads. Toss the stuff right away. Check for notes, letters and bills. That’s the important stuff anyway. And bills? Not many of those because most are automatically paid by direct d...

Yes, this is April Fool’s Day. No, this blog is not playing a trick on you, the reader. Instead, I am letting loose on several topics that individually are major issues in need of solution. Taken together, they represent a catastrophic threat in need of immediate attention. Oh, there will be those who argue one topic or another is not dire, maybe not even a problem in the long run. But I will counter that any problem left unresolved is a threat to our future. And that leads to my first topic. 1.        Not willing to take action: in our own personal lives, corporate careers, and community affairs, we put off solving problems all the time. Some issues are worked on and solved. Some are merely addressed but not managed a twit. But most of the time we talk about issues but do nothing to fundamentally change the danger of those issues. Why is that? why do we shirk from taking responsibility to make the world, our lives, better, friendlier and less dangerous...