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BETTER LISTENING SKILLS FOR BETTER UNDERSTANDING

If practicing better listening skills isn’t a life goal, it should be.
How hard is it to pay attention?
You did it in the classroom with the encouragement of a teacher.
I still remember Mr. Kraus singing ‘Toot toot tootsie goodbye’ when he tossed little tootsie rolls to students with the right answer in algebra.
Maybe we need more of that? Instead we get more of this:

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RETURNING REVERENCE TO IT’S RIGHTFUL PLACE

There’s a scent of reverence in the air, of returning reverence after a long pause.
It started in my doctor’s office where I’d been called to sit on a panel with others.
One of the others was Roy Pittman, one of my personal heroes.
The next time I saw the doctor he told me he was surprised at the way I acted, that I showed reverence to Coach Pittman.
If I did, I didn’t know it. What I remember is feeling awe-struck. Maybe it’s the same thing?
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NBA CHAMPION CROWNED, AGAIN

Becoming an NBA champion is a lifelong goal for every basketball player in the world.
The best want to play the best, beat the best, to tell themselves they’re good enough.
It’s that along with contracts and money and fame.
All of that goes along the wayside when you stop playing in ninth grade like me, or in high school.
Do I blame the coaches that I didn’t become a star, a substitute, or even a benchwarmer?
Noooooo, but . . .
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CLEAN LIVING FOR A QUIET LIFE

Clean living is an art form, and like all art it takes practice.
Yes, we’re talking about practice.
It takes practice to talk without a particular tone, without too much edge.
Do that and you may have a productive conversation.
Go ahead and save the tone and edge for people you don’t know, who don’t know you.
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I READ THE NEWS TODAY OH BOY

The news today is all about world events.
News organizations deliver it every day with the same hype and urgency.
News hounds consume every detail and load it onto the pile they carry in case someone asks them ‘what’s up?’
That’s when you brace yourself for the headlines as if they’re coming from an anchorman. Or woman.
That’s the big news story you NEED to know.
The small news, the stories that make us step back, come out another way.
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toughen up

CDC SAYS OPIOIDS SHOULDN’T BE FIRST CHOICE? THAT HURTS.

Pain relief moves from legal heroin to physical therapy, exercise, and over the counter pills? Who knew? I wrote a post about an author’s reading called BLACK TAR HEROIN, SAM QUINONES, AND DREAMLAND. Sam Quinones showed up in Powell’s City of Books and talked about pill mills supplying zombie customers with their opioid prescriptions; about […]

CARE COACHING TIPS

When It Comes Down To Just You, Care Coaching Makes A Winner. Have you visited a loved one in a nursing home and looked around? What did you see going on in there? How do so many people arrive at this particular destination? Most people have a patented answer: “People need the best care available […]

DR MOLE MOVES FROM HILLSDALE BUT STAYS ON CAPITOL HWY

  One of the best parts of being married long term is sharing the other person’s ups and downs. Over time you get to see how they make their way in the world, to see the face they present to each new challenge.   My wife, Elaine, aka Dr Mole of drmolepdx.com online, arrived at […]

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boomer years

THE BOOMER END OF THE SPEEDO CHALLENGE

    Any challenge but the Speedo Challenge?   Even without a dashing, single-ski dock start, or the dive team Speedo, the man carried a lethal air. He looked like he could fight death and fear, and win. It made him an icon. Leaping off a houseboat deck rail into thin air with one foot […]

THE PORTLAND DREAM GROWS DARK

  Move to Portland, it’ll be fun they say You’ll learn to love clouds on a sunny day It might be weird but you’ll like that Bring your flannel and a lumberjack hat   Move to Portland and bring your skills The new people know how to find the deals Where food is organic, free […]

SANDWICH GENERATION GRANDY MAKES THE RIGHT CALL

I am in a storage space in my house throwing away rings of gauze and squirt bottles of skin care and wound cleaner. It’s a throwback moment with Grandy, my mother in law who passed two years ago. If I had PTSD I would have been thrown back. Instead it was a sweet memory. But […]

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buckle up

HOW TO INTERACT WITH RAJNEESH CULT MEMBERS ON PORTLAND STREETS

    Most days after work in the 80’s I walked the same way to my NW Portland apartment. The path took me past a place called the Martha Washington on SW 11th. I walked the same way so I could talk to an interesting woman from the museum.   Note to remember: All museum […]

ASTORIA BOOKS, ASTORIA DOCUMENTARY, ASTORIA PLAY

Call it Little Big Astoria?   No one doubts the importance of Astoria in Oregon history. Little Big Astoria looms in the imagination from early sea captains challenging the Columbia Bar, to Lewis and Clark showing up overland, to today. The fish packing, lumber mills, and ebb and flow of new people keep Astoria current. […]

BIRD WHISPERER OF TUALATIN NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE

Try and count the times you’ve learned something new only to find it something as old as time. And you didn’t learn anything new at all except for being wrong about what you thought you knew. Like birds.   A bird whisperer visited the wildlife sanctuary just past the junkyard on Highway 99 before Sherwood […]

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