The spirit is such a fragile thing, given to the whims of the times in which it exists. After a fabulous dinner with friends in Ybor City last night, in the rain, I am sitting here this morning in an auto shop, about to spend a great deal of money, and finding myself grateful that other people know how to fix things that I cannot. I say it is a rare place for me because I go and I go and rarely do I pause to drink in the world through which I wander. The air is fresh this morning and the summer heat a bit dissipated. There is promise in the air. Watching the mechanic perform surgery on my vehicle, his hands moving over the engine in a manner reminiscent of Paderewski’s fingers as they flew over the 88 keys of a Steinway concert grand. We take the efforts of others too lightly, I think. We often immortalize the wrong people. We forget the greatness that comes with humility. To those who read this message in a bottle, thanks for finding me.
The Last Beach Day
Clouds drift low,
over dying embers of
last night’s fires
and
quite suddenly
Summer is over,.
Our dreams all spent,
the pools, now covered
with their shrouds
while fog horns sound
off in the distance like
some grieving orchestra
set free to float out to sea
by michevious children
also gone now; their
small footprints as ghosts
of what was.
September
turns down the dance one last time
sobering
those
unfamiliar
with sudden endings
and those scattered
farewells shouted from
parking lots
already sparse
as blankets leave beaches
and jackets are thrown on.
Paper napkins roll ahead
as hot dog stands close up
and market lights are
clicked off as shadows
lengthen deep into September.
As exhausts are revved
into blue black smoke
the last summer drag race
ensues as someone tunes
a guitar one last time.
Thinking With Tears
I find that I often process information with emotion and that emotion has a focusing effect on my thinking and not a distracting one.
Thinking with tears is a way of saying that when I process information, I process that information in a global manner. I use both the left and right sides of my brain to help explain both the reasoning as well as the emotions themselves.
The old argument that emotional thinking is irrational has gone by the wayside. 20% of the human population are highly sensitive and exist in a higher state of empathy. I say this as a way of saying that you, and I are not alone in our emotive thinking.
I find that the patriarchal value system does not allow for this emotive thinking and tend to dismiss. And yet, emotive thinking is not the sole realm of women and is not a feminine attribute; it is a human attribute
Emotive thinking allows for different solutions to enter the process and promotes creative solutions which may or may not be linear. I find that weeping through information also ties it to memory and I remember and recall things much easier than most because I have tied the process to emotion.
This also shortens the learning curve as memory, recall, emotion, and information are all wound together as a common core. So the next time you are out and see something that absolutely overwhelms you and brings you to tears, just go with it.
Then go take a nap
Ample Make This Bed
There are stopping points on any journey and I find that I often do not recognize these resting points for what they are. I complain that I have no projects and I am bored and yet I do nothing to change this.
Instead, I rest, not recognizing that this is what I am supposed to do. The rest becomes so much more enjoyable when I am honest with myself and rest in the resting place I have carved out for myself. A sense of letting go of the baggage I have collected, allowing me to breathe easier, as I toss off the Samsonite, ignoring whether the luggage is damaged, properly stored, or even accounted for.
So my task today is to enjoy the rest, the lack of business, the sweet surrender to the sounds of bees, the small tinkling of wind chimes, and the occasional swell of trees as they talk to each other under the cover of wind.
((The title is from an Emily Dickinson Poem)
1,630 Days
Today, July /24/2025 is 1,630 days since my lovely wife Lynnie passed from Cancer. She slipped to Heaven in her sleep around 10 PM on February 5th, 2021.
Hospice called and broke my world into very small, sharp, pieces; the kind of shattering that makes it hard to glue back together without gaps and holes and such.
I am not the kind of person who looks for happy endings, but this kind of train wreck is not easy to explain. You see the train in the ditch and you see the tracks where it came from but your mind can’t make the leap from one place to the other.
I am still emotionally crippled and tend to stay in the house where I have few surprises. Everywhere I look I see traces of her. I refuse to throw her things out or donate them; instead, I keep them close.
Is it healthy?
How would I know?
What do I care?
I know only that I move in fits and stops and there is a continuous clanking of pieces that don’t fit well together and the mirror doesn’t recognize me either.
But I write and it helps.
This is a very big universe and I don’t know where the fire station is.
Noir Morning
The night shift has ended.
Grey dawn is reddening into pink.
I stand in the parking lot
as West winds bring the smell of
tropical spices from some foreign shore.
I light a cigarette, watching the sky
smelling the bay, listening to
the Palms tell me some things.
Somebody walks by with coffee
and now I am off to the early morning Diner.
I am tired and wonder how long
I can keep up this pace, when I
see the waitress smile and I forget
all that and just watch her move,
thinking of ballet, hearing the music in my head.
I am not sure whose movie I
am in, hers or mine, but it all
feels like that; your life being
narrated by someone else and
I step out for a smoke before the eggs come
and listen to the Palms tell me it’s all okay.
Test Pilots
The first time we broke
the sound barrier
all of us piled on top
of Dad cutting short his
Sunday morning sleep-in
with incredible pops,
squeaks, and other sundry
atmospheric noises.
The second time we broke
the sound barrier, we got
to Mach Two at Kathy:s
birthday party waking
up her dog on the back porch
and scaring the cats
with pots and pans,
and other noisemakers.
In the Sixties, we
ran around the world,
climbed all over
the top of it,
and came back
down for re-entry
in time for milk and cookies
and a brief nap.
We were the original
Test Pilots before
NASA designed their
programs. Given
the proper resources
we kids would have beat
NASA to the Moon
by several years.
How hard is it?
We only have two hemispheres in our brain and yet the algorithmic possibilities of a decision seem, indeed endless. Wonder if my mechanic can take a look at that. He is pretty handy!
German Summer Camp
Mom and Dad said it was supposed to be fun. I believed them and went willingly. I didn’t know any better. I should have though. I had watched “The Great Escape” with Dad countless times. It was a warning unheeded by my desire to paddle canoes, run trails, discover old pirate coves, and dig up priceless treasure.
It was none of that.
Deer have no address
Everytime I drive the back road I see deer leaping across the highway. They never look. They just don’t. And every time I see a deer leaping across the highway I say the same thing; “They come from nowhere.” My partner next to me says quietly, “That is because they have no fixed address.”
I nod, then say, not to be bested, ” It’s probably why they don’t vote either.”
We laugh and drive on. As I glance in the rearview mirror, I see several deer gathered by the side of the road. One of them is giving the hoof.
The Journey Begins
Thanks for joining me!
Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton
In truth, the spiritual road begins when the soul first opens, when we say “Ahhh!” to the World for the first time, no matter at what age that occurs. For me, the spiritual journey began when I first saw a rainbow appear in the water droplets from a lawn sprinkler on a bright and sunny day when I was perhaps seven years old. I have never forgotten the event or the significance; the meaning attached to it, or the magic of that moment.
Notes from the Traveler's Camp 