Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
APRIL 9, 2026 – By way of background for new subscribers who are most unacquainted with me, I hail from a family of professional violinists. It all started with our Grandfather, whose mother had died when he was an infant, and whose father, a Swedish immigrant who worked ungodly hours as a Minneapolis streetcar conductor, …
APRIL 6, 2026 – I’m afraid my brain has gone rogue again, at least in my dreams. What worries me further is the power of suggestive writing—that is, making something occur simply by writing about it. The reader will recall that in last Friday’s post, I described variations of the recurring “litigation dream,” similar to …
APRIL 4, 2026 – I have a very distinct memory of war. No, it didn’t feature bombs going off or people screaming death cries. The setting of my war story was our mostly quiet little town of Anoka, Minnesota, which straddled the Rum River at its confluence with the lazy Mississippi about 20 miles upstream …
MARCH 28, 2026 – As mentioned here last month, I’m scrambling to accumulate a total of 45 hours of continuing legal education (“CLE”) credits by June 30. “Scrambling” is perhaps an over-dramatization. Thanks to a recent change in the rules, all these credits can be assembled by way of webinars viewed on demand. With proper …
MARCH 22, 2026 – As my serial readers know, yesterday’s post involved a brief trip aboard my personal time machine. I assure my younger readers—I’m blessed to have some—that as you travel deeper into old age, your time machine logs miles . . . er, light years . . . at an increasing rate even …
MARCH 22, 2026 – I’m not making up the name—Derward Badger. If I were writing a novel, however, set in the remote reaches of Vermont (admittedly redundant, given that the entire Green Mountain State is relatively isolated) featuring a seemingly odd and inscrutable character, a veritable old Vermonter whose appearances are minor and scattered but …
MARCH 19, 2026 – My wife suffers from chronic insomnia. I hear about it in the morning, because once my head hits the pillow, I myself check out from all my problems, real and imagined, and transition to the wonderland of dreams. But last night was an exception. I was disturbed initially by the minor …
MARCH 18, 2026 – Over the decade from 2009 to 2019, Sally Scoggin and I practiced law; separate firms, different practice areas but the same daily grind of . . . “billable hours.” During that same decade we spent many hundreds of additional hours—entirely non-billable—practicing repertoire for our annual “winter house concerts,” dubbed, “The Fiddler …
MARCH 17, 2026 – I was a fourth-grader—our granddaughter’s age—when the famous St. Patrick’s Day Blizzard slammed Minnesota. School was canceled, mostly on account of the travel hazards facing school buses that ferried all the “farm kids” (whether they lived on actual farms or not) to and from schools in town. We who lived inside …
MARCH 13, 2026 – This evening we enjoyed dinner out with our good friends Jim and Bonnie. Manitou, the popular spot in downtown White Bear Lake, was royally hopping in anticipation of St. Patrick’s Day, just four days away. Just as we were finishing our meal, a Girl Scout in full regalia started making the …
MARCH 12, 2026 – This past Monday’s post was entitled, “Why I Went to College.” Today I learned “Why I went to high school,” or more precisely as regards the latter, “Why I went to a particular high school.” Long-time subscribers to this blog are familiar with my connection to the Green Mountain State; specifically, …
MARCH 10, 2026 – I’m nearly laughing out loud—“LOL” in the vernacular of The Text. Earlier today I struggled mightily in my role as a remote writing mentor for a couple of high school students. In each case it was a classic matter of, “Where do I start?” I don’t mean to disparage my mentees. …
FEBRUARY 13, 2026 – Today a wholly clear smooth on-time uneventful two-hour and seven-minute Delta flight took us from Minneapolis/St. Paul to Hartford . . . to visit our two-and-a-half year old grandson, his new baby sister . . . and their parents. The 90 minutes in MSP terminal were a reminder that perhaps I …
JANUARY 4, 2026 – Yesterday, our old-fashioned mail delivery service dropped into the mail slot of our old-fashioned house, an old-style letter envelope containing two ancient letters and two postcards of the same vintage as the two very old letters. On the face of one of the postcards was a Post-It Note bearing the handwriting …
DECEMBER 30, 2025 – Throughout my childhood I was dragged to concerts by our parents and grandparents and accompanied by my all-too-willing sisters. Invariably, Dad would grade soloists on their stage presence; that is, whether they engaged in distracting histrionics. When it came to the actual music, no one could rival Dad’s discerning ears, but …
DECEMBER 25, 2025 – People who know me well would likely doubt that for a brief time I went through a football phase. Documentary evidence of this improbable stage of my life takes the form of a letter to Santa that by pure coincidence of timing—today being Christmas Day—I rediscovered in a box full of …
DECEMBER 23, 2025 – The regular reader knows by now that I’m a compulsive student of history. Just as some folks are obsessed with NFL football or college basketball (or as I used to be, with major league baseball), I’m zeroed in on “what happened and why” in previous chapters of civilization. What is the …
DECEMBER 22, 2025 – (Cont.) While pulling music from my music cabinet in search of “candidates” for the 50th reunion memorial service, I found many of the pieces I’d performed in the “Fiddler UNDER the Roof” concerts—lots of Bach; the Beethoven “Romances”; “Havanaise” and “Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso” by Camille Saint-Saëns; “Praeludium and Allegro” by …
DECEMBER 21, 2025 – I’m no gardener, though I’ve enjoyed modest success in cultivating basil, my favorite herb. I know plenty of gardeners, however, and I enjoy and fully appreciate the colorful (and tasty) results of their efforts, dedication, knowledge, and expertise. Ditto cooking: I’m no chef, though I can boil water without wrecking the …
DECEMBER 19, 2025 – Today our fourth-grade granddaughter asked me what is the biggest holiday of the year. “In America or in the world?” I asked. “The world.” I was fairly certain it was Christmas, but just to be sure, I searched online. Christmas it was (according to several reputable sites—take my word for it). …
DECEMBER 16, 2025 – Last week I received a new assignment from a favorite business client—the kind that sends good work and allows me to interact with really good people. Without exception, they’re smart, respectful, conscientious, reasonable, interesting, and in the motivational department, appreciative. This latest assignment involved the threshold task of reviewing documents, starting …
NOVEMBER 30, 2025 – Over the past week, my wife and I have become well acquainted with our two-year-old grandson’s expanding toy collection. As I’ve already noted, he’s well into his truck phase, which includes a full complement of cranes, plows, dozers, and excavating machines. He also plays hard with his Duplos and waxed cardboard …
NOVEMBER 20, 2025 – The man looked about my age, maybe older, since he was engaged in a way that I would ascribe to someone who was fully retired and, well, definitely older than I am. He was wearing headphones and waders with a skirt of pouches and moving slowly in waters just beyond the …
NOVEMBER 12, 2025 – When I was a kid, Dad bought a fancy-shmancy lawn sweeper to replace the rake that he’d used every previous fall. It was from Sears Roebuck, which meant he had to assemble it himself. I remember watching him pull the parts out of a large cardboard carton labeled, “Craftsman” and assemble …
NOVEMBER 10, 2025 – Yesterday I partook in one of life’s great pleasures—in the pleasant company of our 10-year old granddaughter, attending a concert of masterpieces performed by world class musicians. It was somewhat of a last-minute operation. One of my sisters had asked me Thursday if I’d be interested in joining her and our …