(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, August 20, 2016)
HAMILTON, CANADA ✦ It’s funny how you can give a torch to someone and he’ll light up the world, and give the same torch to someone else and he’ll burn the place down.
It’s like love and hate. They’re both consuming fires, but with different ends. (The ultimate difference is that hate is all-consuming, and, like evil, will eventually consume itself.)
The good news about the bad news Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator – Friday, July 29, 2016)
HAMILTON, CANADA ✦ It’s a warm and ordinary day, warm and ordinary enough to run around in shorts and bare feet.
The children’s mother, your babe, that is your bride, is playing your song. The cats are in front and the dog’s in back and the kids are doing homework and nothing much is happening, except this song from the piano in the other room, the piece that makes your blood jump every time.
An anniversary wish to the music of my life Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday, July 13, 2016)
SEWICKLEY, PA ✦ Gordie Howe died on the day we played hockey in front of Mario Lemieux’s house. It was one of those things.
Playing hockey with Gordie and Mario — sort of Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator, Monday, July 4, 2016)
HAMILTON, CANADA ✦
“They that wait upon the Lord will mount up with wings as eagles; they will run and not be weary; they will walk and not faint.”
The Hebrew prophet, Isaiah
The sad news of the day, or any day, is that the world is full of people who lack hope and basic belief in themselves because they’ve long been told in one way or another that they’ll never amount to anything, that they have nothing to offer, and the sooner they realize this the better it will be for all concerned.
Lessons we can learn from Eddie the Eagle Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, June 18, 2016)
HAMILTON, CANADA ✦ It was my daughter’s first teenage birthday party and the family van was full of giggling girls.
The verdict on the Tim Bosma trial wasn’t in, not yet, when we pulled into the bowling ally across from Carmen’s banquet hall and I said, “Tim Bosma’s funeral was in that hall. And his wedding too.”
Silence fell. One girl said it was terrible what happened to Tim. Then my barely 13-year-old asked, “Why would they have his wedding and funeral at the same place?”
A world where the beautiful and terrible live side by side Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, May 20, 2016)
HAMILTON, CANADA ✦ So it’s the middle of the night and my wife walks into the bedroom and says: “There’s a mouse in the dishwasher.”
This is strange even for our household, the sort of announcement that suggests my wife is hallucinating from working way too late, again, or that I’m having one of those dreams.
The mouse and the dishwasher Read More »
ATHENS ✦ I’ll never forget the unknown boy and his horrible end, not any more than I’ll forget Arash and his eyes on the day we met when the waters of the Mediterranean were cold.
The unknown boy and finding hope in dark places Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, April 22, 2016)
BRUSSELS-ZAVENTUM AIRPORT ✦ Once upon a time (otherwise known as “the old days,”) people would watch news on their old televisions, or listen on their old radios, or pick up old newspapers that even landed on their front porches (remember front porches?) with a thud.
An airport cross-point in Brussels Read More »
