Musings

By Myrna Conrad We are in the middle of celebrating two very patriotic holidays, Memorial Day and Independence Day. Memorial Day commemorates the men and women who have died in military service for the U.S. Independence Day (Fourth of July) celebrates the birth of American independence from Great Britain on...

By Dave Holland It happened one summer day when I was at Dad’s house. He lived deep in the desert. We were roofing the addition to the house he shared with his new wife. The sun blistered us with 105 degrees of pure hell as I slapped down the black...

By Sean Dietrich On my kitchen counter is a pound cake, sitting on a pedestal, beneath a glass dome. Pound cake is the food of summer. It can make or break the entire season. A summer without pound cake is like church without singing. Or Monet without color. Or Andy without...

By Rick Moore In the eleventh and twelfth grades, students were permitted to leave the school campus for lunch. I remember asking my friend Terry if he wanted to go to the pool hall to get a chilly cheeseburger. He responded by saying his dad would “skin him alive” if...

By Kirk McCarley, Much is written and discussed about the subject of diversity and inclusiveness and exactly what it means.  There are for sure the “visual” considerations related to the color of one’s skin, nationality, sex, and age.  Less visible are the focuses on faith and religious practices and sexual...

By Sean Dietrich My wife and I are going out to dinner tonight. I am waiting for her to get ready. She is in the bathroom, standing before a mirror, pinching her tummy. She asks if I think she is fat. “No,” I say. She frowns. “You sure?” “Yes.” “Well, I feel fat.” She...

By Lauren Catanese, Life is funny. Isn’t it? The path that we live each day, the actions we take, people we interact with, times we stop to breath. Life’s movement will bring us through any and everything our soul needs for its own evolution; it’s purpose. We venture out and...

By Kirk McCarley, “We’re doing twice the work we used to do and getting paid the same.” “This new machine’s not as good as what we had before.” Sound familiar? Consider the first statement, the “do more with less” complaint.  Aren’t nearly all of us are required to be more productive than we...

By Rick Moore, (If you don’t like sad stories, you may not want to read this one.) We had traveled in the bus for over a hundred miles to the campsite located in the hills of Tennessee, as had several other Boy Scout troops from the state. Our Scoutmaster was...

Since this is the month of Easter, I want to reflect on and talk about grace. I know there are various definitions of grace. Among them are: “simple elegance or refinement of movement;” “an attractively polite manner of behaving;” and “a period officially allowed for payment of a sum...