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MAY 1986, THE LAST WEDDING

It was a cloudy, wet, day, in May 1986 for the last wedding.
Like so many raised on the Oregon coast, a cloudy, wet, day, is good luck no matter where you are.
Everything was done, everything set in Sandy, from rented morning coats to a rented preacher.
The preacher was a second choice.
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SHARING SPECIAL DAYS, EVERY LAST ONE

Special days have special meaning which don’t hit the same for everyone.
For some it’s repeating, “Why bother,” for the fortieth time.
Others like to say, “I thought we’ve moved past all that.”
But you still find those looking for something special in every day, and keep looking until they find it. Hell or high water.
The last line is the bell ringer.
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OLD PORTLAND, YOUNG PARENTS

Make that old Portland, youngish parents.
Or not so old Portland, and not so young parents.
We weren’t teenagers, but if you ever want to feel like one push a stroller around downtown.
With two kids it’s like a double punishment, like sent to your room AND missing dinner.
What else?
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LET THEM, LET YOU, OR LET ME?

The Let Them Theory book has a lot of lets in the letters.
My favorites are the parts that address my problems, which come with a writing habit from what I can tell.
Will I discover why I’m not a better writer?
Learn what I should have done by now, or find a lingering message to get over myself already?
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NORTH BEND HEROES START HERE

 Calling North Bend a small town is a disservice to real small towns everywhere.
Driving south on 101 and crossing the North Bend Bridge takes you under this sign.
If you’re not paying close attention and keep going the same direction, the entire area of the largest metro complex on the Oregon coast feels like it’s all North Bend, especially if you miss the little coos bay sign.
How can the biggest city on the coast be a small town?
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toughen up

CANCER ROOM: BEST OF TIMES, WORST OF TIMES

The biggest motivation for writing a cancer room memoir like ‘LICKING CANCER, The Full Response’ is paying tribute to the people I met in there.   From staff to patients, it’s a team focused on the same goal, until it goes off the tracks, and it does in one way or the other for everyone. […]

STEP UP TO THE JUICE BAR, BOOMER

Have One On The House. Doing a juice fast usually means one thing: lots of juice. Finishing a juice fast usually means one thing, too: no more juice. Neither is true. I just finished eight days of adapted juice fasting. Instead of going hardcore juicer, I adapted to a restricted calorie, limited choice diet, to […]

GET A LIFE, THEY SAY. WHAT DO YOU SAY AFTER THAT?

“Get a life” isn’t the worst thing you’ll ever hear. Don’t make it worse. Get a life translation: What ever you’re doing is either wrong time, wrong place, or just plain wrong. Get and new life and make better decisions? Is that the idea? Before you transform yourself into someone you don’t know, don’t want […]

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boomer years

AUTHOR PHOTOS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS? Pt.2

    Exercise your laser beam eyes?   Nothing says “buy snake oil” either in print or bottle, than an expression that includes laser beam eyes.   This author looks like a button downed English professor forced to read WR121 funnel essays year after year. With that in mind does he have laser beam eyes, […]

Historical Debris: A Record Of Time

    Most museums have a bar they set for accepting historical debris, artifacts, one of a kind deals, and whatever an important person touched or signed.   Paul Revere silver, the last breath of Thomas Edison, the Magna Carta? No one is making any more of that stuff, so that’s a bar too high. […]

NATIONAL VIETNAM VETERAN DRILL SERGEANT DAY

    By the time of September, 1974, people joining the armed forces knew they wouldn’t go to Vietnam. At least the people who kept up with the Vietnam War knew, and keeping up was as easy as watching the six o’clock news.   Back then joining the Army wasn’t the same as being drafted, […]

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buckle up

Run Away From Home, Family, Life. But To Where?

If you were lucky growing up you couldn’t run away. Well you could, but would you end up someplace better?   My hometown is North Bend, Oregon. I attended the same grade school, junior high, and high school all in the same school district. So did most of my graduating class.   We didn’t hear […]

THE OREGON SECRET, part 1

Finally Exposed: Portland Street Car Suspicions… Read the transportation editorial on the Oregonian’s Opinion front page, the sort of benchmark work a newspaper of record addresses online and hard copy. In other words, try and stay awake. No thwarted world terror plans to reflect on. No national shootings of note. Just an honest request to […]

FIRST IMPRESSION, YOU ONLY HAVE ONE CHANCE

  My first impression on the Germanic Front Street of Leavenworth, Washington? I met a guy from Poland. He said he was from Poland. I knew he was from somewhere else with his styling appearance. He comes to Leavenworth every year so I asked him about the most authentic German food in town, expecting some […]

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