My grandparents lived in their house in Ohio for nearly 70 years. My mother was able to visit until she was 63, my uncle Paul till he was 68. I was 40 the last time I was there, just after my grandmother’s funeral. They had lived in a small town of about 5,000 people. Both …
“Hubris is the characteristic of excessive confidence or arrogance, which leads a person to believe that he or she may do no wrong. The overwhelming pride caused by hubris is often considered a flaw in character.” Americans aren’t the only people who think we’re the crown of creation, who somehow think we don’t have to live by the …
It’s beginning to look a lot like … like what? This Thursday will be Thanksgiving, but we’re being asked not to hold traditional big family celebrations because of the coronavirus. Otherwise the holiday song will change from “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” to “Grandpa Got Wiped out by a Virus.” Actually, the day …
I didn’t realize I was old enough to have a photo of me in sepia. It isn’t like I’ve never seen one before. I had a picture done in 1989 in Virginia City, Nevada, with my friends Tom Kensler and Greg Henry. Of course that was a staged old-timey photo of three gunslingers. It was …
It’s amazing when we consider things in our lives that used to mean so much to us and now mean so little. Once was a time in my life that it mattered desperately to me that the Washington Redskins would win. In fact, if I consider things that had no real effect on my life, …
I was in the drugstore the other day when I saw something that made me think. It was on the pharmacy counter, an incentive for getting a flu shot or some such thing. An assortment of small packages of candy — Peanut M&Ms, Nestle’s Crunch bars and … wait for it … Junior Mints. I …
“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” One of the most famous quotes of all time has been attributed to the French philosopher Voltaire, but he never actually said it. Neither did Francois-Marie Arouet, although it’s possible Billy Voltaire said it as one of …
When you’re young, the last thing you expect of your friends is that they’ll die. It happens – auto accidents, childhood cancer, that sort of thing – but when it does, it’s nearly always a shock. When we lose friends as kids, it’s nearly always because they move away. I lost two best friends at …
Are you aware of the most profound thing you ever told someone else? I wasn’t. Until my son told me. When I married Virgile’s mother and became a dad to him and his sister Pauline, I had to acquire a new set of skills at age 42. They had a father, but he was 6,000 …
During my 30 years or so as a professional journalist and more than 12 years since, there is one way I always judged whether someone’s writing was good. If I read it and was really impressed, one thought always crossed my mind: “I wish I had written that.” One of the first times I felt …
