Wednesday, December 06, 2017
American Future? ~
I am beginning to see States breaking away from the Union as a result of growing division due to viral political convictions.
Thursday, November 23, 2017
Thanksgiving 2017 ~
What will the topic of conversation be today when families sit down to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal?
Monday, November 13, 2017
Playing the Piano ~
I am beginning to feel something new going on with my hands when playing. It seems as if they are no longer two separate instruments. I can feel them as one, giving the feeling I am gently throwing balls, like a juggler, from one to the another.
St. Benedict ~
He was a genius to have made a rule under which men could live together in community and thrive. His key was the virtue of humility that he insisted on instilling in his members. A perfect Benedictine, following the Gospel dictate should always "take the last place".
Wednesday, November 01, 2017
An Offhand Remark ~
I heard someone say: "Fingers have memory." Ever since hearing that my piano playing has improved noticeably.
Monday, October 09, 2017
Local Beauty ~
The neighbors next-door cut down this stately red beech tree this morning.
Leaf-raking was too much of a chore. . .
Just lost a friend.
Thursday, October 05, 2017
Sunday, October 01, 2017
Choice of Words ~
"Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out! He’s fired. He’s fired!"
~ President of the United States
~ President of the United States
Monday, September 25, 2017
Was Ist Los? ~
80-90 seats in the German Bundestag will now be filled by the new extreme right AfD party that won yesterday in the elections.
Sunday, September 03, 2017
Cavalier's Delict ~
Here in Germany no one is really upset about VW and Audi cheating. No rage, no protests, no demonstrations. Cheating is all part of the game.
Saturday, August 19, 2017
Seasons Don't Wait ~
Sadly, I see the first tinge of autumn today on the maple trees along my path.
Monday, July 31, 2017
Boy Scouts of America ~
It was reported that the chief executive of the Boy Scouts had apologized for the President's speech held at a national gathering of Boy Scouts because of his rousing political statements. The White House spokeswoman deftly sidestepped saying: "I saw nothing but roughly 40,000 to 45,000 Boy Scouts cheering the president on throughout his remarks and I think they were pretty excited that he was there."
Saturday, July 01, 2017
Protectors ~
Two stately San Bernardino dogs out in front of a lady with their unneeded leashes would turn every thirty paces to see if she were coming along.
Thursday, June 22, 2017
Newfound Energy ~
Five new windmills on a hill in the distance rotating day and night, counterclockwise.
Monday, May 08, 2017
Tuesday, April 11, 2017
Thursday, April 06, 2017
Yevgeny Yevtushenko ~
† April 1, 2017
BABI YAR
by Yevgeny Yevtushenko
No monument stands over Babi Yar.
A steep cliff only, like the rudest headstone.
I am afraid.
Today, I am as old
As the entire Jewish race itself . . .
Friday, March 31, 2017
At 7:45 in the Morning ~
The highway is buzzing with cars heading off at high speed to make it to the place of work with all the people who are helping to hold this world together.
Tuesday, March 14, 2017
Cosmic Reverberations ~
Today at a funeral while they played Mozart's Clarinet Concerto K 622 Adagio and the world stood still . . .
Saturday, February 18, 2017
Seeing in Darkness ~
To look up into the sky late at night and see the radiant stars . . . and then orient myself in the deep cosmos.
Monday, January 30, 2017
Beacon Light ~
Americans, the President said: "make no concealment of the fact that we want wealth, but there are many other things we want more. We want peace and honor, and that charity which is so strong as element of all civilization. The chief ideal of the American people is idealism. I cannot repeat too often that America is a nation of idealists. That is the only motive to which they ever give any strong and lasting reaction."
President Calvin Coolidge 1923-29
Wednesday, January 11, 2017
Sunday, December 18, 2016
Progressing ~
Went back to my old seminary where four teenage years of intense living took place. There I found only a bare hill with grass going on it. The building has been torn down, deemed useless.
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
New Experience ~
It was a happy dream . . . I was standing in front of a grade-school class and a boy didn't know the German word for "page". "Oh, that was the very first word we leaned in Chapter One of our German book last year," I said. And all those little girls and boys lit up and smiled with such glowing faces, the likes of which I had never seen before.
Sunday, November 13, 2016
God's Will Works ~
It is in silence, the old monk said, like when the sun rises, or in the silent chamber of the heart that God's will works.
Tuesday, November 01, 2016
Crucial Decisions ~
All the really important decisions in life-- I had no real knowledge what it was all about: Priesthood, Marriage, Children. All a blind leap.
Saturday, October 22, 2016
Grief in Our Town ~
Not enough room in the church for all his friends, many stood outside. Lukas was 18 years old, had just acquired his driver's licence. He was driving to the train station to pick up a friend when he lost control . . .
Monday, October 10, 2016
Autumn Yearning ~
I see little birds flying south in clusters. It is raining and cold. How will they ever make it over the Alps?
Saturday, September 24, 2016
Classroom ~
I taught her in the fifth grade. She wrote saying I made a great impression on her for the rest of her life, for I had told her once to brush her teeth every day. She had done that and has a set of teeth to this day that everyone admires.
Tuesday, September 13, 2016
Goings-on ~
I heard someone comparing the catastrophic political atmosphere with John of the Cross's Dark Night of the Soul. He saw it positively, as laying the ground for a spiritual recovery, once everything has been reduced to nothing . . .
Friday, September 02, 2016
De Diligendo Deo ~
God is Great— What do you do if your notion of God and Jesus conflict? The former seems for the most part confined by the latter.
Monday, August 29, 2016
Coming into Focus ~
With 80-plus finally coming to understand what a momentous, catastrophic event the First World War was.
Thursday, August 11, 2016
Memory Fading ~
. . . Now I know why mother was irritated every time I wanted to play our do-you-remember game . . .
Monday, August 01, 2016
You are what you will ~
. . . I discover that it was my desires that regulated my advancement/lack of advancement in life. I never got beyond what I desired.
Sunday, July 24, 2016
With 80 Plus ~
The liberating awareness that there is really nothing we have to believe in . . . once we have learned to trust.
Wednesday, July 13, 2016
Mother ~
Came across this obituary in the newspaper this morning:
"For the world she was a nobody, for me she was the world. I had to let my mother go. My love and gratitude for her will only die when I die."
"For the world she was a nobody, for me she was the world. I had to let my mother go. My love and gratitude for her will only die when I die."
Monday, July 04, 2016
Disappointment ~
Drove 250 miles to Schwaebisch Hall just to see this painting. But, just five days before, it had been sent to Berlin on loan.
Saturday, May 28, 2016
Bounty ~
The lilacs are so profuse this year that,
when I open my window near the bush,
their sweet scent comes flooding in.
Saturday, May 21, 2016
With 80 Plus ~
On seeing people over 60 I feel a strong sympathetic tie with them, a felt respect, just because they have made it so far through life. They too, have been "through the mill" . . .
Saturday, April 30, 2016
Flying Time ~
The fastest hour of the day is the one I spend at the piano after breakfast.
Tuesday, April 19, 2016
Encouragement ~
Last night In a dream I was trying to convince a down-and-out parish priest how good his work had been and how I admired him for his steady, sincere apostleship. I called him a Man of God, but he wouldn't hear it.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
With 80 plus ~
With 80 plus it isn't so much the surfaces of things that interests you, but rather what under-girds them.
Thursday, April 07, 2016
Wednesday, March 30, 2016
Urology Verdict~
There was an eerie, absolute silence in the waiting room at the doctor's office this morning, broken only by the nurse almost inaudibly requesting the next patients.
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Contentment ~
Wednesday, March 09, 2016
With 80 plus ~
. . . You realize that at 70 you started to see things as they really were.
Monday, February 22, 2016
Thursday, February 11, 2016
With 80 plus ~
Monday, February 01, 2016
With 80 plus
Friday, January 15, 2016
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