“There’s a tool for that.” I can’t tell you how many times I heard my Dad say that. And in the oddity of life, no matter what task we had to do there was a tool for it; not just some tool but a specific tool. Someone, somewhere, at some time had faced whatever challenge we were facing and had designed a tool to get it done with a fair amount of … [Read more...]

The definition of manhood has undergone a torturous number of questionable revisions.  Some of those revisions have been reflectively thoughtful.  However, most of them appear to have been largely thoughtless.  It seems that we’ve attempted to realign the definition of manhood in order to better align it with other definitions in our culture that … [Read more...]

Over the years I have written an extensive array of books, articles, blogs and quotes. During special times of the year, I search these writings for quotes to both enrich and enlarge our celebration of that particular season. For Father’s Day, I have selected a handful of quotations that express the power and importance of being a father. In a … [Read more...]

I was thinking.  And the more I thought, the more I realized that there is a whole lot to think about.  But in my thinking, I thought that most of our thinking (despite how much there is to think about) is really pretty standardized and chafingly rote.  We think we think, but the more I think about that, the less I think we think (if you know what … [Read more...]

The nature of our humanity is such that we are thirsty for connectivity, desperate for relationship, vibrantly enlivened by the sharing of souls, and wildly transformed when another life dares to connect with us in those places raw and wounded.  We do not live in isolation, and to think so is to ignore the undeniable connectivity that occurs when … [Read more...]

We hear a lot of things.  A whole lot of things.  We’re incessantly bombarded with sheets and shards and streams of information.  It’s about bits and bytes and boatloads of data that we ingest and digest without even realizing that we’re doing that.  Either consciously or unconsciously we compile all of that sordid stuff into some sort of choppy … [Read more...]

We’re building memorials every day.  Whether we realize it or not, or whether think about it or not we’re very much involved in the business of building memorials, and we’re doing it every single day.  The memorials that we’re building are the ones that will be about our lives.  Every choice, every decision, every action, every inaction, every … [Read more...]

In large part, Memorial Day has devolved into a weekend that represents the onset of the summer season.  It’s something like the starting gun at the beginning of a race.  It’s the day that officially frees us from the doldrums of winter and gives us some sort of permission to play for the next three months or so until Labor Day reminds us that it’s … [Read more...]

I grew up under the tutelage of a generation who faced the depravity of the Great Depression and then fought through the horrors of World War II.  The deep sense of patriotism and solemn respect for our country ran high among these great people. Therefore, as Memorial Day once again rolls around on the calendar, I find it appropriate to take a … [Read more...]

There are times when we the best of our logic fails to understand the worst of other’s behaviors.  It’s part of the oddity or maybe complexity of the human psyche that we sometimes make choices that defy any shred of reason or seem void of even the slightest hint of sensibility.  More times than we can count we stand in awe of the choices that some … [Read more...]