A friend was sorting through a deck of animal spirit cards. The premise is simple: if a particular animal appears in our lives through a sighting, a dream, the drawing of a card, or some other unexpected encounter, it may be bringing a timely message. A reminder. An invitation. Perhaps even revealing something about our nature, our past, or the path before us. The meanings associated with each animal are said to be drawn from the wisdom of Indigenous traditions, often invitin

I was sitting outside with a friend in near total darkness. There were frogs and birds talking much louder than during the daytime. That caused me to wonder if they talk louder at night because they have to. Duck, Duck, Goose. The game kids play. A friend has adapted that with the kids she works with to Blossom, Blossom, Flower. Giving the poor animals a break. How about Mouse, Mouse, Cat? Or Apple, Apple, Peach? Another friend sent me a note about how he “laughed his butt

Imagine stepping out of your Manhattan hotel. Expecting motion. Expecting the noise of tires swishing as cars pass by. Horns blaring, sirens in the distance. Chatter of pedestrians. A rush of humanity brushing past you in both directions. Instead, you experience nothing. A six-lane street stretches out before you, empty. No pedestrians. No rush. A single car glides by every 45 seconds or so, as if on assignment. Parking lots built for hundreds hold three lonely vehicles. No

I was in Nashville a while back and took a familiar drive out into the countryside. Since I was last there, HUGE, gargantuan mansions have been built. I found myself hoping that the people’s happiness level was as big as their house. Help here please: Hand Over Fist….? Holy Mother of Pearl….? Kicked the bucket…? “He’s so angry with me that he’d have my guts for garters.” I know what they mean, but how did they come into existence? I could look it up, but I think I would rat

The other day, a man I’ve known since he sat in my high school classroom decades ago wrote to me. There was a tone that seeped through his written question. A tone I recognized because I can sing that tune also. The kind of statements dressed in their mocking, sarcastic, dismissive, judgment wrapped in its thin costume skin that from a distance sounds like a question. He asked, “Do you really believe anything you write, in your newsletters, your posts, makes a difference, cha

I heard someone say "HOLY SH*T". What does that mean? I was wondering how and when does/did s**t become holy? How about Cows, and Toledo as additional “Holy’s”? And “Pray tell?” What’s that all about? And where did the term, “I’ll take a gander (look) at that” come from? “He doesn’t have a lick of sense,” she said. I knew what she was saying but wondered how much a lick is, and if one wanted more, where might they go to get it. Wondered also where that phrase came from

My father spent more than forty years as a civilian employee of the United States Air Force. Except for the final stretch of his career, he worked at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, in Fairborn/Dayton Ohio, starting back when Wright Field and Patterson Field were still spoken of as separate places before history fused them together after World War II. As a family, usually on a Saturday night, we would go to an overlook of the airbase to watch the military aircraft land and t

People ask me what I do. Here’s my answer: “Have you ever heard someone say, “I’m my own worst enemy?” I help people change that. If I ever wrote a book about my life, I think the title of it would be “Cutting Grass.” And it would have nothing to do with marijuana. It would have to do with where and when I do my best and most expansive thinking. I just read a research article that suggests our best ideas come at that point where we are half sleep and half awake. What wou

Metanoia. A word meaning radical change. A conversion. In my case, a radicalization. I am writing this blog because I asked a few Republican friends of mine, on the day that one of the Minnesotans was shot dead in the street what it might take for them to say, “There is something wrong here, and it is not the guy who was shot or the little 5 year-old sent to a detention center in Texas” The essence of the answers I got back was they couldn’t imagine anything which would cau

Some have questioned why I do this “Random Thoughts” thing, when what they prefer are the one topic blogs I also do every month. Fair question. For one thing I have so many thoughts every day it would be impossible for me to write in detail about all of them. So, I honor them by mentioning them by name, knowing that I could riff on any one of them for a couple of pages, at least. I carry this notion that if I stay open to all of the thoughts I have that keeps the pipeline

The Electric Chair One of my biggest fears growing up was that I would get blamed for something I didn’t do. I had nightmares about it. The fear was that I would be blamed for something, go to jail and be executed for something I didn’t do. It was real. I was terrified. I know it sounds dramatic, but it was real. Part of that I am sure was a result of my unique weirdness as a human being. Other parts came from my actual experience. I grew up in an environment where I was the

I was thinking how much my language has been derived from farming. Terms such as “Living high on the hog,” “A cut above,” “Walking in tall cotton,” All hat; no cattle.” Thank you Farmers. I grew up with the family farm being the hub of our clan’s wheel. I once asked my grandfather if after I graduated from High School, if I could come work on the farm (as my career.) As I remember, he said “No” with a few expletives about my even asking. I imagine his response was a lot

There is a restaurant in Nashville that I frequented often when I lived there. It is now the first stop I make every time I return. I get off the plane, rent a car, and head straight there. When I am in Nashville and lunchtime rolls around, the question inevitably comes up: “What about lunch?” (or breakfast or dinner). Whether I am with others or not, my first thought is Wendell Smith’s. (53 rd and Charlotte). If I am with some friends or clients, I would never recommen

I went home recently. Back home, my childhood home. To Ohio. Not the kind of home with a welcome mat or a key hidden under a rock, but the deeper kind. The one that lives in muscle memory, in the soles of your feet, in the way your chest tightens before you even know why. I went back to the places, people and land that birthed me, raised me, nurtured me, shaped me, marked me. I did not go alone. I was accompanied by my sister, whose beautiful presence made the journey feel

Loneliness, I’ve come to think, might be defined as that moment when I reach out for an arm to steady myself… and find the shirt sleeve empty. CNN is doing a special series featuring Anthony Bourdain—years after he took his own life. Unless his family is benefitting in some way, I can’t help but see it as profoundly exploitive. Something about it doesn’t sit right in my bones. The other night I watched a movie called Rez Ball, and suddenly I was back on the Navajo (Diné) r

My body is like an old car that has been in the family a LONG time. Relatively reliable for driving around town, but not so much anymore for embarking on a cross-country trip, probably should stay in the garage if it is going to rain, etc. One of the books I am reading ( White Lies: How the South Lost the Civil War Then Rewrote Its History) helped me figure out who I am. I would have been a “scalawag” back in the day, and a proud one. What’s with the word , “Shebang.”

Forty years ago, I was sitting in a large auditorium with hundreds of others, listening to an internationally renowned Christian minister. He was famously known for, instead of standing behind a pulpit, delivering the message de jour wandering the aisles of the auditorium. As usual, I was sitting upfront in a seat right next to the aisle. As he was nearing where I was sitting, his eyes and mine met, he seemingly interrupted his message, put his hand on my left shoulder, and s

I wonder if aging makes words more precious and thus more poetry. That seems to be happening to me. A teacher of mine once said something like, “Poetry is prose without the unnecessary words.” I find myself not noticing the noise until it stops. And when the noise stops, the conversations that my psyche has been waiting to have with me begin with a whisper. As I lean forward into those words, they become stronger and move from that whisper to full on conversation. A

I began my professional career in 1967 as a schoolteacher. Eighth grade remedial English to remedial students (all boys) in a...

When grieving and I come to the point of asking, “But what can I do?”, am I using the thoughts that arise to avoid more grieving? ...