Je Me Reveiller Ce Matin
If you can't shake your ass to Clifton Chenier, your system sucks.
Time Traveler
If we rely on our experience of time to always be sequential, this experience will only seem sentimental. But if we allow ourselves to understand that eternity always touches the present moment, we can begin to experience the presence of people we remember.
Here it comes
He kept the self righteous smugness under wraps most of the time, but you could see it at the corners of his mouth whenever Peter got earnest or Thomas seemed needy. It's a wonder that this didn't happen sooner.
And I thought I was so smart
In a culture built on consumerism and, therefore, rife with false narratives constructed by marketing teams, it is a rare and difficult thing to live with authenticity. To do so is "foolishness" to use St. Paul's term, because it seems like the kind of authenticity …
To the commissary counter
Lazlo's smile still reached his cheeks, but it no longer creased the skin around his eyes. He'd show up for a cookout and everyone would act like they were happy to see him, but he inevitably wound up in a corner, picking at his plate. …
We are sick and tired of hearing your song
So whether you caucused with the Herodians and collaborated with the empire or provided the most visible yet respectable opposition as a member the Pharisees , you would have had a stake in preserving the status quo in some form in order to preserve your …
Come sunshine, come rain
I was happy like Maria in an alpine meadow on a sunny summer day. I noticed within me a willingness to experience that happiness, as if it were a type of weather. I knew that it would pass; not every day will be sunny, cerulean …
Not the highlight reel
When I was a child, my family owned a 1972 Chevrolet Kingswood Estate. We were a Chevrolet family, or at least that is how I thought of us. My mother drove the Kingswood Estate, which was Chevy's version of the kind of station wagon lampooned …
How can I tell you about my loved one?
John Lennon famously used to make fun of Paul McCartney's songwriting, calling them "silly love songs." It's not hard to grasp Lennon's point; there may not be another emotion that gets exploited more than love (although we are getting pretty good at anger these days.) …
Take this sabbath day
There's a wonderful John O'Donohue poem, A Blessing For One Who Is Exhuasted, that includes the maxim "Be excessively gentle with yourself." There are days when that is the only mantra which will sustain me. In a world that values productivity so highly that we …
A new Odyssey?
I got on Substack for the bikes. Specifically, I wanted to subscribe to Spencer Martin's Beyond the Peloton, which is not about the exercise bike (as it may seem from a first impression) but rather about professional cycling. He hosts a podcast with Johan Bruyneel …
A time to chill
Advent in general, and this Advent in particular, feels to me like time spent setting up in the fridge. I've stirred my ingredients up a bit this year, and I have imagined this process as similar to a caterpillar in a chrysalis. Something about that …