Soon the calendar will shift for another roll through dates, through seasons and all the moments we have no way of knowing from here. Each of us lives in our own contagion of this following that. The unavoidable change that is living itself can sometimes feel unnerving — or at least the anticipation of it, the impossibility I already mentioned of knowing completely any change before it happens. I’ve been writing this… Read More
“The first step is faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” Martin Luther King, Jr “If you’re walking down the right path and you’re willing to keep walking, eventually you’ll make progress.” Barack Obama Sasha Obama hugged her dad after he took the Presidential Oath of Office yesterday. “Good job, Dad,” she said. “I did it,” her father responded. Then today, President Obama stood before… Read More
Last night there were fireworks in the rain for the last game of the season for the Portland Timbers — our professional soccer team. The season ended with a tie between the Timbers and the San Jose Earthquakes. I wasn’t at the game. And, true confession, I didn’t know about it. But the sound was enormous for 20 minutes or more. My imagination ran the gammut, but I remembered my friend Dia… Read More
Another post so soon??? YES! Here’s an antidote to all the contention and polemic flying around the airwaves and unfortunately, too easily eddying in our own ruminations. We still have over a week before the election. During that time it’s only vastly possible that the theater of opposition will amp up. The essential subtext of all the contention is that we the people not only should but do dislike, disrespect and fear… Read More
My work is in a graduate school. I am responsible for helping prepare people to be educators, mental health professionals and community leaders. We need them, so I give my very best to enabling their brilliance and their good hearts. One of the questions I often ask my students is, “What do you want?” I sometimes have them write for a while – a good while – in answer to this question. … Read More
This morning a friend in Omaha told me about Sam, a friend of his who was off for ten days on a third anniversary trip to the particular beauty of the Colorado Rockies around Estes Park. My friend has spoken of Sam before, describing him as a notably successful businessman who’s built a thriving company that supplies materials for building or renovating homes. Sam’s success, though, is lately not enough to bring… Read More
Of late a good deal of national opposition has arisen around the words “build it.” Some months ago, our president made a point in a public (and arguably campaign) speech about the labor that supports most, if not all of the social activity in this country, including business. Some folks heard his comments as indicating they shouldn’t get credit for their work. The media and campaign publicity machines got hold of the… Read More
If there were a word to sum up the trouble with our elections and the leaders they bring us, what would it be? Thinking back on the 100 Voices I listened to in 2009, Americans around the country offered words like immature, disappointing, ridiculous, greedy, irrelevant. Ed Kemp, III in Jackson, MS said “useless.” Then he elaborated. “Senators and congressmen ought to all be farmers. They get up in the morning. They… Read More
My 19-year-old niece Mary is in Israel. So is Mitt Romney. Mary arrived almost 4 weeks ago to assist with rebuilding homes of Palestinian people that have been destroyed in the areas of the country historically populated by Palestinians now being displaced. Many of those lands are occupied by Jewish settlers. These are complicated issues from the standpoint of local, national and international politics. They are less complicated but more urgent and… Read More
My friend Murry is in a protracted conversation with esophageal cancer. He knows all too well that his condition didn’t come from nowhere. The president spoke yesterday to matters in the Middle East – to the changes signified with the public uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia. He spoke to Israel and Palestine– to that protracted conversation. We all know that none of that came from nowhere. Today I took a photo of… Read More
Clare Consultation, LLC