Sneaking Into New York City Today is Father’s Day according to convention in the United States that begun, more or less, in 1910. A Day for honoring fathers has been a part of Western culture since the Middle Ages. Mothers have been honored formally in the U.S. since about the same time as fathers in the Unites States, but more broadly, mothers have been held on a pedestal for at least one day of the…
Tiering Up Today we drove the last leg of our Eastbound journey from California to New York. That rounds off to 2,800 miles in seven days of driving for an average daily ride of 400 miles. Today’s ride was only 335 miles, so about five and a half hours plus whatever stops we decided to make. We made it a forced march at 5mph over the speed limit (which I figure put us marginally over…
Ski In Ski Out A road trip across country at my age is bound to raise lots of memories. Indeed, today was a day of memories unlike yesterday. There is nothing wrong with the ride from San Diego through Las Vegas and up through the Virgin Valley Gorge into the red rocks of Southern Utah. In fact, it’s fair to say it’s one of my favorite areas of the United States, but we were just…
Falling to Earth I spent much of my drive yesterday through Utah listening to Ben Rhodes, the DeputyNational Security Advisor to Barack Obama, reading his newest book, After the Fall. It is a set of tremendously insightful vignettes from his post-White House years traveling around the world interacting with consulting clients. The specific theme is that democracy is not so much about to fall apart, but actually has begun the process of falling apart. His…
Susie and Pete We had dinner last night at Susie and Pete’s house in Wabash, Indiana, Kim’s old home town. Kim and Betty even stayed there last night since the Charley Creek Inn, in downtown Wabash is not so pet-friendly. Gary and Oswaldo and I stayed at the Charley Creek Inn, which, despite it’s uncharacteristically unfriendly approach to Betty, is an old, turn-of-the-prior-century hotel, restored with love and a refined eye for detail into a…
The Girls at the Beach The other day Kim asked me if I thought my sisters would like to have a copy of a picture she found of the two of them in our mother’s hands, standing at the beach. Out mother had her hair being whipped about by the coastal breeze and the girls looked somewhat less than as exuberant as her. Kathy, the eldest, with her dark pixie haircut was looking up at…
What Matters A few weeks ago something popped up on one of my social media feeds or I got a commercial junk email (I don’t remember which) and these specially curated or personalized product offerings looked very familiar to me. There were metal-clad hoses (I have bought three of for from Hammacher Schlemmer over the past year), Gorilla carts (I am the proud owner of one of these back-savers) and outdoor metal sculpture (Lord knows…
The Eclectic Home A few years ago we visited two homes on either coast of the country. One was the New York condominium apartment of a an old colleague and the other was a friend’s condo out here in the West. Both homes had something in common, they were as lovely and well-decorated as a model home on HGTV might be, but they both equally lacked any soul. They didn’t looked lived-in. Indeed, both were…
Hey, Neighbor When I started writing about selling yesterday, I did so to lead into a story about canvassing my neighborhood selling the idea of a gathering we are planning. When I write, I have a general direction I head off towards, but I purposefully allow myself the flexibility to wander wherever my thoughts take me. In the case of yesterday’s story about selling, I got to my daily word limit before I had had…
The Entry as Space The analysis of space holds a special place in my education. The professor who taught my Freshman Writing Seminar in the Fall of 1971 was technically a professor of Art History. Every Freshman had to take writing seminars their first two semesters. The academic powers that be at Cornell in those days felt that writing skill was a necessary component of the education of all students, regardless of anticipated major and…