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TAKING PART IN FAMILY LIFE

Family life takes time. Ask the Baldwins with their seven kids.
Keep that in mind, you youngsters, when you decide it’s time to join in.
Join the club, the family club, sooner than later.
Why?
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THE TRUTH, GETTING A HANDLE

Getting a handle on the truth shouldn’t be a big hurdle to clear.
All it takes is a little self-awareness.
The truth is your friend if you’re not too sketchy.
Will it set you free? Well . . .
It depends on the sort of shackles your used to.
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‘DOING RESEARCH’ AND OTHER EXCUSES

What counts as doing research?
For writers it’s an easy answer: Everything is research.
And because everything is research, the trick is finding what matters more.
Is it writing about where you are, how you feel, the people you’re with?
The correct answer? All of the above.
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TWO STORIES + ONE MAN = GREAT LITERATURE? OK LEO

Where does great literature come from?
From more than two stories, but first about ‘that man.’
The great literature man.
Where does he come from?
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GRACE AND DIGNITY FOR AGING MILLENNIALS

I became my ‘brother’s keeper’ through misjudgment, and it wasn’t my brother but my father in-law.
Same idea, though. I think it’s the same idea.
And it was misjudgment, not a mistake.
What happened?
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toughen up

MILLENNIAL SELF CARE = SELF RESPONSIBILITY

  You know it’s not pledge week when NPR rags millennials about ‘self-care.’ Instead of pledging money to them, they’ll buy an ‘experience’ instead. Cue Jimi Hendrix? Gracy Obuchowicz says it’s more than just social media that has pushed millennials to the forefront of the self-care discussion. “Our generation has seen enough,” she said. “People […]

GUN TALK THE WRONG WAY … AGAIN

Raw Story posted a gun column about white men and guns. It was the sort of gun talk white men with guns shouldn’t identify with. “White men stockpile guns because they’re scared of black people and feel inadequate, science says.” That’s the rawstory title. It’s raw, but even more, it’s lazy, but a site called […]

BOOMERITIS, OR WHY DOES IT HURT WHEN I DO THIS?

The Longer You Let Yourself Go, The Longer The Trail Back. One doctor joke goes like this: “It hurts when I raise my arm.” Doc says, “Don’t raise your arm.” It’s as funny the first time as it is the last, if you don’t have arm pain. Most of us have pain from one thing […]

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boomer years

HELICOPTER PARENT WISH LIST

My mother discovered stolen contraband the night she pretended to hang up my coat. The ‘hang the coat up’ frisk was a classic move. I’ve used it with my own kids. The item she found was a seventy nine cent writing tablet that opened like a book. She asked where it came from, I gave […]

OREGON BABY BOOMER GRAY STREAK

Oregon baby boomer hopes for more in the home state. In Oregon it’s more blue sky and sunshine. More days of unexpected kindness. More reasons to trust. When it feels like your state, not just a current address, you need more goodness just to break even. And that’s if you’re lucky. Live in Oregon long […]

DON’T MEAN NOTHING? OR EVERYTHING?

The Torture Report. All war anniversaries, from WWI, to Pearl Harbor, to closing the operational command in Afghanistan, feel the same. It’s all Vietnam. That war played out on the nightly news through junior high and high school for my classmates. It was the war older brothers were drafted for, the war that robbed another […]

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buckle up

GOODBYE PORTLAND IT’S BEEN FUN

If you leave, just say goodbye Portland. That’s all. Portland visitor’s say goodbye Portland when they leave. Maybe they’ll be back, maybe not. Saying goodbye Portland says it all. You came, you saw, you didn’t stay. If you did stay, if you decided Portland was the only place in the world for you, then you […]

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 […]

Baby Boomer Travel, pt 1

Plan Ahead Or Suffer. Once you step out your front door the machinery kicks into gear. It’s either too late to change plans, or you don’t want to be the one changing. Be a good sport. Baby boomers know how to be good sports. We also know how to whine so don’t be alarmed when […]

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