Sometimes, morning arrives when you least expect it. Looking out the wallet-sized window of the small motel cabin, there was some light in the sky which meant I had slept eight or nine hours. Stomach was empty and complaining, bladder was full and complaining, and as I switched the light on my eyes were constricting and [...]
In my tent, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the woods, in the middle of Indiana, I was awake and I was alone … not lonely, alone. Traveling across the US was doing what I had intended to do and I was more than half-way. This was not a painful ‘alone’, rather [...]
Jacksonville, Florida had become the 80% mark of my journey, the end of the fourth leg of five … first: from Tucson, Arizona to Denver, Colorado, second: (unplanned and spur-of-the-moment) from Denver to New Orleans, third: from New Orleans to Chicago, and now, I had just completed the fourth … from Chicago to Florida. The final [...]
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MY JOURNEY AS A VOTER As a child and then a teenager, I grew up under two fine Presidents … Democrat Harry S. Truman, followed by a Republican, Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Ike”. To me, then, the US two-party system seemed up to the task of selecting decent leadership. As Eisenhower’s term was ending, we had a [...]
BEING ALONE In my tent, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the woods, in the middle of Indiana, I was awake and I was alone … not lonely, alone. Traveling across the US on a putt-putt scooter at 40 miles an hour was doing what I had intended to do and I [...]
OKTOBERFEST TRADE DEAL In the middle 1960’s, at Oktoberfest in Munich, I was involved in an unusual trade transaction (at least by Western standards). My first time visiting Europe, I was in my mid-twenties. Fueled by a more than ample supply of Oktoberfest beer, the trade involved a handsome German couple, me the olive-skinned Arizona tourist, [...]
THE CONFESSION 1945 – In Connecticut, almost six years of age, I was being ‘trained’ to be a good Roman Catholic boy. One part of that training was studying the Latin necessary to serve mass as an altar boy. Another part was to ‘go to confession’ and recite my sins to a priest sitting in a [...]
Reader's Note: Having relived this story a few hundred times over the years, I still laugh every time. Then a question arises, given that the big sin had already been committed, the big sin of being late to God’s House (because that sneaky god had tested us with perfect snow). The question arises what could I [...]
SEPARATION AT THIRTEEN Traveling with a friend, talking of many diverse topics. She asked me about the bravest thing I had ever done. Not knowing the bravest thing I had ever done, I did know when I had been the most scared. Having thought about that, my answer went something like this. It had to do [...]