Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
NOVEMBER 21, 2024 – Today I had to turn inward, away from the public square back to the workbench of my figurative second floor shop with its windows overlooking the public space. Of course, except for a few characters who reside in the public zone every waking moment—engaged in various forms of theater and theatrics—most …
OCTOBER 30, 2024 – Today I went to a doctor’s appointment. For the first time in a decade (when my parents were alive), it wasn’t on my own account. The patient was a severely ailing family member, however, and for months my wife and I had been working on getting him to today’s appointment. By …
OCTOBER 12, 2024 – Today our granddaughter celebrated her ninth birthday. At our son’s request my wife and I “got scarce” for nearly the entire duration of the shindig, which was staged at our house. At first we were a bit miffed at being excluded, but as I observed the birthday girl’s mother and dad …
OCTOBER 1, 2024 – Today in the Heartland fall was in the air, though the sun was bright in a cloudless sky. After reviewing convoluted legal descriptions all morning, I burst out of work mode and embarked on my daily power walk up and down the hills of Little Switzerland. On my second climb to …
AUGUST 25, 2024 – The other day I found myself aboard a spacecraft entering the parking lot of a Costco store in East Lyme, CT. It could just as well have been a Costco store back home in Minnesota: the lot was jammed with cars, except their license plates bore the motto, “The Constitution State” …
MAY 23, 2024 – (Cont.) Menard’s, Lowe’s, and Home Depot have become emporia selling everything a person needs to build a house and fill it wall-to-wall from the basement floor to the attic rafters, with all the props and fittings known to the Great American consumer. And every single item that fills one of these …
MAY 22, 2024 – These days you have to ask yourself—what is America? A crazy place? A terribly bad place? A wonderfully good place? A country about to push itself over the edge of a precipice? The most resilient nation on earth, still destined to be . . . dare I say it . . …
DECEMBER 8, 2023 – After school yesterday, Beth picked up Illiana from school and ferried her back to our house to play for a while before swimming class at 5:00. I was disappointed I couldn’t join in fun around the house, but I was in the middle of a three-hour Zoom conference. With my microphone …
MAY 15, 2023 – For a half hour today, I slowed down the merry-go-round and savored time with our first grade granddaughter. It was my turn to pick up Illiana from school, and when she slipped into the car, she asked if we could go to a playground. “Sure,” I said. “Which one?” “How about …
MAY 8, 2023 – As we navigate through life, we’re often oblivious to the random influence we have on one another. Today on my return from “Little Switzerland,” I walked past a house and yard that have been worked over beautifully by the owner. Over the years I’ve observed the substantial sweat equity he’s invested …
MAY 4, 2023 – (Cont.) 5. Travis, wearing a neat, clean pair of striped bib overalls appears at the door and accompanies Malarkey to the latter’s house. From the driveway, Malarkey points to the second story fascia board in need of replacement. “I don’t climb on roofs,” says Travis. “I promised my ex that out …
MAY 3, 2023 – Our seven-year-old granddaughter and I joke a lot about co-authoring children’s books patterned after her many favorite “silly series,” such as the Old Lady who Swallowed a [Something or other] or the Seussian classics that rhyme like “a lime on the nose of a Thing like our Zing with a ring.” …
APRIL 29, 2023 – Years ago, Beth, my wife, bought the World in an all-inclusive deal: seven seas, seven continents, seven thousand islands upon a wide-diameter sphere—mounted on a handsome, wooden floor stand. The garage sale price, fully haggled, came to five bucks. The acquisition was for me (the consummate geography nerd) and fulfilled my …
APRIL 28, 2023 – To catch up on my continuing legal education credits, lately I’ve been attending web-based seminars featuring a bevy of lawyers talking about the finer points of one sub-set or another of . . . the law. I shouldn’t be surprised that many of them speak with a very strong Minnesota accent; …
APRIL 21, 2023 – The problem with being in the same boat as everyone else, is you can’t complain. So much as a grunt marks you as a grump, and who wants to be rowing against that reputation? You have only two options: howling in private or bailing out of the boat. If you howl …
APRIL 11, 2023 – On this part of the planet, in many years we often skip spring and go directly from winter to summer. That seems to be the case this year. Just a week ago last Saturday, we woke up to another seven inches of snow on what was already a record amount of …
APRIL 5, 2023 – (Cont.) As the directors of food and hunt prize procurements helped Fred pack up the surpluses, the director of communications, pulled me aside. I’d noticed her activity in the thick of the extravaganza but hadn’t had a chance to greet her. “Hi, Eric,” she said. “You might not remember me, but …
APRIL 4, 2023 – (Cont.) Since the big Easter Egg Hunt was scheduled for late Saturday morning, Illiana stayed overnight with us Friday, though she and her parents live only six miles away. As fortune would have it, however, a major March-end lion roared across our region Friday evening, leaving in its angry wake a …
APRIL 1, 2023 – My grandpa Nilsson, a violinist, launched my three sisters on their own careers as violinists. He and they were in perfect synch: he was a serious teacher, and they were serious students. In my case, he practically stood on his head trying first to get me to practice, and when that …
MARCH 15, 2023 – If you want to check out from the woes of the world, spend a couple of days with a first-grader at a snowbound cabin in the Northwoods. That’s the formula that my wife and I followed starting Tuesday evening. After our seven-year-old granddaughter’s swimming class at the “Y,” the three of …
MARCH 8, 2023 – (Cont.) Brother Abraham’s letter is entitled, “My Favorite Things,” which is as innocuous as his first sentence is predictable: “Life in a monastery is designed to give the monks and guests constant reminders of the centrality of God.” Brother Abraham then mentions the seven daily corporate prayer sessions in the Abbey …
MARCH 6, 2023 – (Cont.) It was known as the “McCauley Mansion,” built by a member of the McCauley clan, who’d made tidy money during the early days of the lumbering town. But all had gone to wreck and ruin by the time Harriet McCauley, inheritor of the home, had reached her 50s. By 1960, …
MARCH 5, 2023 – (Cont.) Then one day late last fall I saw a “NOTICE” taped to the side door of the house. The city was finally taking action. But if St. Paul is slow to plow its streets after a snowstorm, the city’s even slower about addressing troubled properties. Only last week was the …
MARCH 4, 2023 – We live in an older neighborhood adjacent to even older neighborhoods. Except for times when we’ve been out of town, nearly every day of the past three and half decades I’ve passed by the same old—or renovated—houses on my daily exercise routine. For the most part, these dwellings are tidy and …
FEBRUARY 4, 2023 – Maybe winter’s getting to me. Yesterday I’d talked by phone with Beth about our narrowing drive and how our plow guy will have to round up a front-end loader to remove enough snow to accommodate the large gas truck that refills our propane tank. Otherwise, for the rest of the winter, …