Monthly Archives: April 2018

The Essential Vice

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There is a tendency for many of us to think we’re smarter, more evolved—superior, really—than others. Whatever we’re doing at the moment, including what we know, the way we live our lives—we consider to be on a higher plain than the other “deluded” mortals. They call that hubris, I think.

I’ve started meditating. I already know some of you are going, “kooky.” That’s fine.

Whenever I set aside time to for this practice, my mind sets off running in a myriad of directions, like it always does when I try to slow it down and locate space away from the “white noise” of daily life.

“Why don’t others meditate?” my thoughts often communicate back to me with smugness. That pride thing.

Actually, others do meditate. Mark embraced meditation over the last four years of his life. He let me know he meditated, but he never made me feel inadequate because I didn’t (and “couldn’t”) for the longest time. Continue reading →

Newspaper Reading

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I have a vested interest in people’s ability to read—I’m a writer, for God’s sake! And while the model of books and publishing has been turned on it’s head by digital technology, print still offers us a route to the future, I think (at least, I hope it does).

A week ago Saturday, I drove into Portland for a book event. Author Steve Almond was in town at Longfellow Books. He was slated to be paired with local writing star, Ron Currie Jr. It promised to be an evening worth leaving the house for during a season when it felt (at least a week ago) that spring’s been detained somewhere else..

Unfortunately, Currie had a personal matter that kept him from facilitating the discussion, but a rising Maine legislative star, Ryan Fecteau, was pressed into action on short notice. He performed admirably. All this to say that Almond’s new book and provocative discussion around the idea that we’re telling each other the wrong or “bad stories” has been on my mind since.

People who once occupied prominent space in my life recognized the importance of stories and maybe better—reading. My son, Mark, comes immediately to mind. But unlike others who have dropped out of my orbit (by choice), he walked his talk. I’ll always remember the years we spent a fall Saturday in Copley Square at yet another Boston Book Festival, and the year he ended the day toting two overflowing canvas grocery bags that must have weighed about 75 pounds each, overflowing with books. We have a bookshelf in our house that’s filled with books he had at his Providence house. Mark had “de-cluttered” his life in a Marie Kondo-esque manner, but he still kept books. I’d say that 3/4 of the things we carted back to Maine when we emptied his room after he was killed were books. I still marvel at his reading lists.

Weekend reading.

Continue reading →

Who Taught You To Live Like That?

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When I was typing out the title to this post, I accidentally pecked out “who taught you to lie like that.” I had to chuckle because I was thinking that very thing this morning while ruminating about a certain president who resembles a Cheeto, and the prevaricators who carry his water.

But I don’t want to write about him (today).

I blogged about emotional intelligence the other day. Another topic that remains in heavy rotation in my thinking.

Canadian bands and artists have colored my musical palette for quite some time. I think it dates back to a trip to Montreal that our unit of three made back in the early 1990s. I ended up finding a cassette tape by The Tragically Hip (RIP Gord Downie). I became a fanboy from then on for their north-of-the-border take on classic rock.

I finally got to see “The Hip” play live at The State Theater. There were probably 500 people there on a hot August night in ’98 to see Canadian rock royalty perform. The show wasn’t heavily promoted. Mary and I learned about it when a plane flew over Old Orchard Beach pulling a streamer that said, “Tragically Hip at State Theater” that night. I said to her, “we should go.” And we did. It’s probably one of five shows we’ve attended together in our 35 years of marriage. What our pursuit of live music lacks in quantity, I think it more than makes up for in quality, though: Cheap Trick (with UFO opening), Dave Mason, The Grateful Dead, Lucinda Williams (The Bottle Rockets), and The Tragically Hip. Continue reading →

What’s Your EQ?

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From time-to-time, I’ll review blog topics I’ve brushed up against. Partly, I do this to ensure I don’t duplicate posts or topics (except posts about topics that I think need to be highlighted).

What surprised me was that while I’ve been thinking (and talking) about the topic of “emotional intelligence” a lot lately, I only have one post with that tag. That one was written last March, and only briefly touched on the topic. I mentioned it after I came across an (obscure) book written about the grief and loss associated with losing an adult child.

One thing that is all-too-clear to me is that we are being affected by leaders deficient in this crucial capability. And if you haven’t experienced the fallout yet, I’m sure you will at some point in the future, rest assured.

Mark cultivated the traits of an emotionally healthy, attuned adult. What are these?

According to The Dictionary of Psychology, written by Andrew Colman, he posits that emotional intelligence (EQ) is characterized by the “capability of individuals to recognize their own emotions and those of others, discern between different feelings and label them appropriately, use emotional information to guide thinking and behavior, and manage and/or adjust emotions to adapt to environments or achieve one’s goal(s).” Continue reading →

Conned by Casein

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We are living in the age of the con. Our president serves as our “con-artist-in-chief,” a tour guide of sorts in the art of deception.

One thing I should have learned in life—but I still seem to require regular reminders—is that if something becomes popular, everyone wants to jump on the bandwagon and extract their own element of profit. Nowhere is this more evident than in food.

As someone who has lost (and gained) significant amounts of weight on my mesomorphic frame, I’ve yo-yoed back and forth on the scale. I’ve also been on all manner of wacky diets—like the time I was pounding protein in the form of bacon and steak, with very few vegetables or fruit items. It’s only been the last few years where I’ve focused on eating healthier foods, while eliminating as much processed junk as possible.

In the fall of 2016, just prior to Mark leaving on his final walk, I decided to become a plant-based vegan. I have no regrets about that choice, and I’m glad Mark knew his mom and dad had become healthier humans prior to his death. Continue reading →

A Month of Poems

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April is National Poetry Month. Thirty days for celebrating words, wordsmiths, and the poets who subvert the status quo.

Do you think Donald Trump reads poetry? Maybe he should put the Twitter down and pick up some Walt Whitman. Whitman wrote,

This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.

Mark was a poet, an award-winning one. While he was out walking across America for something bigger than himself, he was writing poems, like this one: Continue reading →

Easter: Just Another Sad Holiday

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Today is Easter Sunday. Some of you got up and went to a sunrise service. I used to like these. Being outside, in nature, helped connect theology to Earth. Of course, many Christians don’t care about Earth because they’re fixated on heaven.

I’m not a practicing Christian these days, whatever that means. When I was 21, I was naïve. I didn’t know any better. Thirty-five years ago, I simply accepted the false notion that “Christians aren’t perfect,” to excuse the abhorrent behavior I found inside “the fold.”

When you embrace something new, there is always a honeymoon period. Having been raised Catholic, I was attracted to the enthusiasm for scripture I found in many other believers during my initial Protestant foray. I loved the freedom that came from reading the Bible for myself, not having it spoon-fed to me by a priest.

For the Catholics I knew, Jesus wasn’t seen as a revolutionary or renewing figure in their brand of religion. That’s not to say that Catholics don’t believe in Jesus, just that salvation is a different process than “simply believe and be saved,” as I came to understand Christianity back in 1980.

My born-againism “lit a fire” in me, enough so that I left school at UMaine and walked away from my second love (Mary was my first), baseball. But, it doesn’t take long for this initial zeal to cool, or get squashed. Or, in my case, moved to another location. In this instance, it was Crown Point, Indiana, and Hyles-Anderson College.

My experiences at Hyles-Anderson have been documented here and here, as well in one of my essays in the previous book I put out, The Perfect Number: Essays & Stories Vol. 1. Things in the Hoosier State didn’t turn out as expected. Continue reading →