Category: transcendence

You Can Hear Me, Minnie

The first evidence of our pug’s hearing loss was her sudden disinterest in barking at the garbage man. We mistook it for age related apathy at the time, the same sort that overtakes older humans, should we live long enough. Then she stopped noticing when people walked into […]

Cynicism is Cheap

“Vote Trump!” This from a middle-aged man in a Seahawks jersey, the same who moments earlier struck a boo-hoo symphony in the supermarket checkout line over the inflated cost of beer. The man’s directive is aimed at a pair of younger guys, twenty-somethings by the look of them, […]

Do the Difficult

It didn’t strike me until Ms. Christmas said, “I’m going to pick up our one kid from school.”“Can you believe it?” she asked. “We only have one kid!”I’m getting a little slow with age. A few ticks of the clock went by before I caught her meaning. We […]

Get Your Head Out Of The Game

“You taught me the courage of stars before you left.How light carries on endlessly, even after death.”Saturn – Sleeping At Last We’ve been binging episodes of Friday Night Lights at my house. It’s an entertaining and addictive show that’s only nominally about football and much more about teen […]

Wish of a Billion Wishers

The girl with the sticky fingers doesn’t know she holds a rare artifact beneath her thumb. Please don’t think she’s stupid for that. Her mother doesn’t know either. Neither would you, were it your hand holding me (or your jeans pocket, or change purse, or the little compartment […]

Nobody Wants To Be Anywhere

“Nobody wants to be anywhere. Nobody likes anything.”Jerry Seinfeld – 23 Hours To Kill If there’s a single statement which accurately describes the spirit of our age, these words from Seinfeld do as well as any. He finishes the thought by saying, “We’re cranky, we’re irritable, and we’re […]

The Birthday Stealer

It’s time again for my annual birthday story. Writers sometimes talk of stories that write themselves. The older I get, the more elusive I find such stories to be. This one, however, did write itself. Channeling this tale brought me comfort; I hope it does the same for […]

It’s All Movies

“Churches and trains, they all look the same to me now.” Amsterdam, Gregory Alan Isakov A months old conversation I had with a friend keeps replaying in my mind. “Teenagers have this thing they like to say, ‘It’s all just movies.’” It was uttered with great concern, a […]