View From Here

An occasion happens. We note its specialness. It causes us to think a bit more, to feel more. I stop and ponder related meanings. Shortly I realize I am taking the pulse of my life, determining what really matters to me. What has mattered to me all along. Is it a simple belief? A person, a single person in my life? Is it my kids? My ideology? My what? Exactly. What is it that matters the most to me. That is what I’m getting at. What matters the most to me, you, to all of us? That is a powerful question, isn’t it? Considering it, I quickly think about special people in my life. I think of my own ability to survive life at all, its many slings and arrows. But then things pop to mind. A special antique, or the home itself, or the things I usually take for granted. Along this path lies an appreciation for money that is produced by career, and then the career itself, the colleagues, institutions and connections aplenty. Along with money is what it provides most, power to gain other th...

Indeed, yes. Trump is just that. Some projected this was his intention all along. Others pooh poohed it. And I just wondered. Until now. Executive orders are temporary and focused on exact actions and policies. Not forever. Not even for real if the underlying circumstances do not warrant such action. Check on each EO of Trump’s, and you will note the political nature of each, the ideological bent to them all, and their purpose becomes clear. Control. Of everyday matters. They are political, vengeful, targeted, and bent. Just like Trump. Just like a control freak. Tyrannical. His actions are also without much forethought. Quick with little substantial thinking behind the entirety of the EO itself. This reflects pettiness. This reinforces vengefulness. And lying. The constant lying. So much lying we have little basis of knowing what truth he does spill from time to time. He is a totally unreliable source of information and facts. His skew is so reliably a lie, we don’t listen any...

Diversity. Equity. Inclusion. It took nearly 250 years for these three words to become real in American policy, public discussion and action. 250 years in spite of the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, law of the land. 250 years. Disgraceful. Women have been discriminated against. Ask them today. Do they feel discrimination in their lives. You bet they do. And for good reason. Discrimination is still a real concern for them in their own lives. The same with African Americans. Ask them if they feel discrimination in their lives. Their answer is a certainty; yes. And the same goes for most immigrants if not all. And for those who do not mark current discrimination, their immigrant group most likely did feel the horrendous pressure of discrimination at one time in our nation’s history. Difference is the cause. Being different from the main group of people populating our land; they are the discriminators in the main. Difference. That’s all it takes. Like being a wo...

Like most people, I have credit cards, debit card, and a checking account accessible by electronic means. Shopping online is a convenience enjoyed by many and needed by a lot of people with limited mobility. Elders certainly fit this bill, but so do many others with disabilities, illness as well as healthy people living far from shopping areas. I will soon do grocery shopping electronically because it avoids getting in an out of the car, loading a shopping cart with goods, and then loading them into the car and unloading them at home. Soon I will order online, the store will gather the goods and notify when I can pick them up by car, their staff loading the goods into the car. So much activity saved and risk of falling avoided. The risk, of course, is inviting fraudsters to access my payment information and debit/credit cards. This has occurred with me five times in the past 3 years. Always the debit card, but one credit card questionable. The credit union and I agreed to replace the...

I was raised expecting to go to college. So was my sister. My brother chose another route without considering college. He did well in life and is currently marching through retirement at age 87. Sister and I graduated from college, both small liberal arts colleges. She went on to professional development and excellent business achievement. I attempted one master’s degree program (seminary) but dropped out to pursue other career interests. Later, I pursued another master’s program and graduated with the degree. I never attempted a PhD but thought of it often. I just never committed the time or focus on it. However, my bachelor’s and master’s degrees have served me well. They taught me to think critically. Read, grasp content, form questions on that content, pursue more reading and research, then form conclusions on fuller details. When expectations from those understandings failed in some way or another, I pursued more reading and research. My understanding of countless subjects gre...

·          Sugar Intake: I drink two cups of coffee each morning, first thing. I pour three heaping teaspoons full of sugar into the brew, each cup. I love coffee and its taste but dislike the bitterness. Thus, sugar is consumed. But  that’s it. I use sugar rarely thereafter. I used to consume pots of coffee daily but that involved a lot of sugar. Later in life I realized I used too much sugar, and it couldn’t be good for me. So, I limited my coffee intake and that solved the immediate problem. I put sugar on hot and cold cereals, too, but then I started to avoid cereals. Problem eliminated. How much sugar do you consume? ·          Salt Intake: like sugar, salt is a common dietary component in our eating habits. It is used as an ingredient and often used to add to the final product on my plate. I read that salt was not good for the body so monitored my use of it. Now I rarely use it and then sparingl...

An ocean of orange, tinged with red. Vibrant and too huge to ignore. The breeze was truly wafting and gentle. The sky was darkening to black from deep blue. The air was dry. This was the desert after all. The stillness captured my breath. The big orange ball sank below the horizon on its own timeline. Cactus were outlined starkly. Soft greens and grays were muted to shadows as sunlight gradually disappeared. The hills, mountains, mesas and flat desert landscapes were a dimly lit scene of beauty changing slowly in lessening light. This memory of desert sun setting could be repeated endlessly for New Mexico, Colorado, and every state. The landscape would be different, but the same process and reality would occur. What is special is the gigantic openness of Arizona (and New Mexico) because of the desert. It is special. It pulls you in every time. I am transfixed every time. It is just one small attraction of the American southwest. Being there is accompanied by the smells and feelin...

I’ve stated here before that I rarely suffer from blank page syndrome when writing. Writing anything. Most of us recall the awful times when we were assigned a homework essay to write and we couldn’t come up with anything for a very long, agonizing period. But that rarely occurred for me. Instead, I had plenty to say right then and now. That continued well into my adult years. It always seemed that interesting things beckoned understanding, research or whatever. And all I did about it was explain it. To imaginary others. Thus, my writing career began. Somehow people asked me to write something for them. Soon it was supervisors and business colleagues. Reports were the result, some long, some short, but all focused on an assignment not of my making. Now I write whatever whenever. It just happens. Catch an idea in midair, and the next thing I know I’m writing about it. Like this blog today. I didn’t have a topic at hand and thought of the empty page problem experienced by many. Mos...

Volo, Illinois is the place. Started as a car museum, it now includes artifacts from the Titanic, tractors, trucks and campers among other things. Boats, too. Our tour started with cars of the 50’s and 60’s. We noted very few if any 40’s, the cars of my very early youth. Our family had a 1941 Pontiac, followed by a ’51 Dodge and then a ’56 Buick. Dad replaced the Buick with a ’61 Ford Galaxie. The Buick became my drive around vehicle, and later to college in Illinois but only in my Senior year. It was during the ‘40’s that Dad and I competed in naming car models and their model year. We both got quite good at it, me even dabbling back to the 30’s models. By the 50’s, we were in high gear! Then my college years in the 60’s saw me replace the old Buick with a 65 Mustang: poppy red with white interior. Quite the snazzler following graduation. I was and am still addicted to cars. The Mustang was replaced with a 66 Chrysler 300, then a 67 Mustang, then seminary years. Ann had a 67 or ...

Weather, ours : alright, in spite of global warming, Chicago area weather has been downright brilliant. Warm but not too hot temps, some rain to keep lawns and bushes green, and comfortable breezes to keep us cooler on hot days. Plentiful sunshine graces our days. An El Nino winter (warmer and less snowy) gave us last winter’s perfection, while a promised El Nina winter approaching will likely be more of the same, just a little colder and more snowy than last year, but not as much as normal years. Chicago has fared much better than other areas of the nation in recent years. We know this will not hold, but we can appreciate when it’s our turn for great weather. Noise : sirens, train horns, traffic, especially semi-trucks, doors slamming, dropping things on the floor above your apartment, neighborhood dog barks. These are just some of the noises we all put up with throughout life. In my case, the condo building is across the street from the mainline track of the Union Pacific railroad. W...

Many definitions for grit. Bits of sand and tiny pieces of rock is probably the most common definition. But strength is another, and persistence is yet another. I tend to focus on the first, personally. Where I come from – the southwest – sand and bits of rock are common. It is the stuff of sandstorms, sandy coverings of paths, walkways, and that sort of thing. In the New England of my youth, grit was spread on slippery winter roadways to provide traction. Later, salt and chemicals became the norm. In a literary framework, grit is the substance of reality and everyday life. Looking down at the feet when walking on unpaved surfaces, we can see grit. Small animals live in a world of grit. Cars drive through grit all the time. Grit in this sense is almost cellular, not just granular. Recognizing grit, thinking about it, means the real world to me. We walk on it. We can feel it. The grit of persistence allows us to survive the pitfalls of life and arrive on the other side. We accep...

It appears first in communication style. Maybe a little snarky, or slow and delayed? Word choice favoring loaded meanings enter here as well. Mainly, it is just not being anchored to any sense of what is meaningful between the two or three family members. It may take a few years for the patterns to become recognized, even then it is often missed. An outsider is often helpful, usually quite unplanned. A friend may witness an interchange between you and another family member and casually ask what’s wrong between the two of you? Of course, you are clueless and ask why. The discussion can be quite illuminating. My family and I have been separated by many miles for many decades. A sister in Arizona, a brother in New York and me in Illinois. There have been geographical shifts in years past, but this alignment has been current for 40 years now. Who initiates communications is where I start but this is not always a good indicator. Who picks up on the letter, phone message or email and fol...

Imagine that! The eighth month of the ‘new year’. Time marches on. It just does, with us or without us. Progress or the opposite! Some of that intentional, some not. Even the ‘not progress’ is intentional, some not. It’s the intentional that bothers me the most. The ‘not progress' bit. I know ideological differences exist, but when dismantling something hurts millions of people, how can this be allowed to happen? Before such government programs existed to help the poor and sick, private charity was expected to fill the gaps. It didn’t. So much it didn’t, that society as a whole was hurt by the suffering and degradation of fellow Americans. Hospitals were inundated by people who needed care but could not pay their bills. Courts were filled with lawsuits attempting to collect the unpaid bills. Insurance companies caught up to some of this, but employers had to ante up the premium dollars as worker benefits to make up some of the difference. The unemployed, of course, were not helpe...