The past few weeks I’ve been dealing with our apple crop. You wouldn’t think a humble house in the suburbs would also be a burgeoning apple orchard, but my wife has vision. “I’ll just plant a few trees,” she said. At first, I was only annoyed because...
My day was blown up right after work when I noticed a guy struggling to start his pickup truck. I had just finished my day job and was plotting my evening: write this newsletter, write my novel, play with the dogs, and exercise. I’d have time later o...
Back in high school there was a minor bully I’ll call John. He was really more of a toady, hanging around some of the tough kids. Or maybe he was more of a sidekick, like Garth was to Wayne, Barney was to Fred, or Sancho Panza was to Don Quixote. Reg...
This week, my mother would have turned 95. She’s been gone a while, but I think of her often, and how she schemed and fought for what she believed was right. She didn’t win all of her battles—it’s tough when the deck is stacked against you—but she wo...
I found a dead opossum in the yard this morning. It was a youngster and I’m saddened, as my dog may have had a paw in its death. Opossum are occasional visitors to our yard and the dogs go berserk but hadn’t harmed one before. Typically, the opossum...
The first person who suggested I might become a writer was my eighth grade English teacher, Mrs. Recht (pronounced wrecked). The irony was that she wasn’t trying to encourage me; she was humiliating another student. She’d given us a book report assig...
When my father died, he had seven boats. No, he wasn’t an international shipping mogul. He merely liked to fish. But… But, at some point, his interest in boats superseded the interest in fishing. When you drive past someone on a bridge with a line in...
The 4th of July is this week. For those of you outside of America, it’s one of the big six holidays here, meaning the trash collection is delayed a day because even the trash collectors get to take July 4th as a holiday. The big six are New Year’s, M...
The best advice I ever received was to never start a land war in Asia, but that’s basically where I’m at now. The Asia part is my back yard and I’ve fallen into the trap of fighting because of suburban America’s obsession with green lawn. Growing up,...
Back in the 90s, I worked at an office here in Lansing where a group of coworkers, all men, were primarily focused on three things: Second breakfast Meter maids Sex workers We worked on the eighth floor and had a view of Kalamazoo Avenue. Around nine...