The eleventh in a series of occasional posts about tripping along U.S. Highway 395. It’s seven in the morning and it’s toasty inside The Rainbow Cafe in Pendleton, Oregon. Outside it’s, as my daddy used to say, colder than a well digger’s ass. That is, the temp is somewhere south of 30 degrees. I’ve never …
The boy turned 13. Thirteen begs a question. Is he still a boy? For a time, back when he was two or three, he would insist that he was a boy. Whenever Cora or I presented him with the proposition that he was a person he responded with a reasoning, “I’m not a person, I’m …
Banner photo. Dad having a cold one. North Africa? Italy? Hey dad. When you were a youth, did you ever wonder what kind of father you might be? You were at loose ends during most of your twenties. Did you even entertain the prospect of fatherhood? You had a lot of time to run those …
“There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.” Everything has a price. I’m not giving away anything really tangible here. The “free” in the title of this piece refers to “free-flowing.” Random thoughts; aimless; catch as catch can; spitballing. Even remnants o’stuff that never made it into posts. But bear in mind that everything …
Since you went away the days grow long And soon I’ll hear old winter’s song But I miss you most of all my darling When autumn leaves start to fall ~ Songwriters: Johnny Mercer / Jacques Andre Marie Prevert / Joseph Kosma I detest that song Autumn Leaves. Yeah I know, it’s a sort of …
And so, on this day I decided that Rainey’s last moments would be in her cherished upstairs. Jessica and I gently got Rainey on the dog bed and carried her upstairs.
It’s 2020. This month marks four years since we put our Rainey to sleep. I wrote this four years ago. This is the third in a series of posts from a now defunct blog. I started the series in July of that year as it seemed that we were on the verge of losing our …
It’s 2020. This week marks four years since we put our Rainey to sleep. I wrote this four years ago. This is the second of a series of posts from a now defunct blog. I started the series in July of that year as it seemed that we were on the verge of losing our …
It’s 2020. This week marks four years since we put our Rainey to sleep. I wrote this four years ago, the first of a series of posts in a now defunct blog. I started the series in July of that year as it seemed that we were on the verge of losing our girl. I …
The end of another shelter in place week and we’re officially two months in. This week the weather decided to turn back the clock to the beginning of our lockdown nine weeks ago, mid-March. When it hasn’t been raining this week it’s been blustery and chilly, for the Bay Area that is, a qualifier that …
If you want to eat macaroni and cheese at 2 am and wake up at 1 pm only to watch Netflix for 5 hours then okay. And yes, that’s pretty much how it is now and it’s perfectly acceptable.
We sat on the couch together as we have for 38 years and it dawned on me that Cora and Nana have become inextricably tied. And I recognized that this was a good thing.
There is pain. And then there is pain. It’s the pain that cleaves your heart and makes you feel as if you’re tumbling into a chasm with no end. It’s the pain that exhausts you to sleep.
Her tools are her nose, eyes, stamina and a boundless desire to please her human. But it’s the nose that’s the primary tool and her skill in putting it to work comes from an instinct hardwired into her through centuries of breeding and heredity.
Dogs have been a big part of my life. This is what will likely be the first of many posts on dogs from time to time. “My fashion philosophy is, if you’re not covered in dog hair, your life is empty.” ~ Elayne Boosler. It was a few months after our Gordon Setter, Rainey was …