I was such an inconsiderate idiot. I’m so sorry, dude, that I totally wrecked your day. We were driving along in the late afternoon yesterday, and I stopped to let a guy cross the road. You were behind me. There were a lot of cars, and the guy had been standing there for a minute, waiting for a break in the traffic. No, he wasn’t at a crosswalk. But it looked like he could use a little kindness, so I gave it to him. You…
After last week’s terrorist attacks in Paris, people started modifying their Facebook profile pictures with an overlay of the French flag, ostensibly to show support for Paris and the people impacted by the violence that took place across the city. As with anything on Facebook, this quickly became a trend. Shortly thereafter came a wave of outcry from people who questioned the public outpouring of support for Paris while the previous day’s bombings in Beirut received scant attention or condemnation. To many, this disproportionate reaction…
The New Year is here. It’s time to take a few deep breaths, square our shoulders and get it on. I’m feeling stupidly optimistic about the year ahead. Here are ten thoughts going in: Weird is better than humorless. Experts agree. So, if you feel that special inclination, go for it. You’re not getting any younger. There’s a lot of discord out there. Our fellow human beings sometimes make a mess of things; in the best case, they disappoint us and in the worse,…
Although I've thought about it about a lot, I’ve never written about racism. For starters, I wasn’t sure I had the right. But even more, I’ve been too afraid: afraid of creating more pain and anger, afraid of my own ignorance, afraid of exposing less than desirable parts of myself. But in light of recent events in Ferguson, it’s clear that we don’t have the luxury of remaining frozen. I want to talk about it. It may be hard. It may be awkward. But I have…
There was some pushing, shoving and panty bunching on Facebook over the past weekend. It resulted in a few folks getting their feathers ruffled and one angry boy taking his ball and going home. Sigh. It all started with football. When the Seahawks play, several people, myself included, post commentary throughout the game. It’s an odd way of enjoying the game together. Sometimes I post a lot, sometimes less so. It depends on my mood and how the game is going. I definitely see many posts…
Two weeks ago today, our worlds intersected on the 12th Street Bridge. It was just the two of us. I was on my way home. You were seconds away from ending everything. I was unwitting. You were despondent. You climbed on the railing. I wondered what…but before I could even finish the thought, you jumped. Life had its way with you, dear one, and gravity finished the job. I was the sole witness to your final tortured moments. I was somehow able to call 9-1-1, to…
Black Friday. The mad crush of humanity at its worst. We’ve watched aghast another year as images on the nightly news and throughout social media show people clawing, punching, scratching, kicking and sometimes even shooting to get to the holy grail of discounted flat screens, gaming consoles and i-gadgets. This odious ritual has become the unofficial (and unfortunate) kickoff to the holiday season. “Deck the halls” has turned into “deck other people in the malls.” Elves tremble in fear and department store Santas…
A few weeks ago, former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson had a bit of a public unraveling at a press conference. He was speaking to reporters about his first fight card with Iron Mike Productions, a new promotion venture, when his remarks took an unexpected turn to the personal. He opened up that he'd recently had a slip in his recovery from alcoholism and that he needed help. He went straight to the heart of the matter, “I’m on the verge of dying because I’m…
I spent the weekend trying to write a new post for this blog. My plan was to kick off a new series about the creative process, starting on the topic of inspiration. Although I’d riffed on the subject in my journal for a week or more, when I sat down to write this weekend, I couldn’t seem to get there. All my thoughts were on Japan. As I read the news stories and watched the horrifying video clips, I knew that anything I had to…