Musings of a Middle Aged Man

One of America's many pride points is being known as a melting pot for the myriad people, immigrants from other countries who chose to settle in the United States and live the American Dream. However, the "American Dream", with its 2.5 kids, a suburban home with a white picket fence, and equal opportunity for all, it is a massive lie. A damn lie....

All anger is a mask for fear to wear. ~B.B. Griffith One would think enough people would or could learn from history the devastating effects of anger on societies and individuals, that individuals would have evolved toward a more beneficent society with a corresponding increase in world peace. Sadly, it seems the opposite has become the norm. History through the modern day is littered with the cor...

Before Ronnie, Just Say No, Reagan left office he deregulated the NEWS organizations releasing them from the 'burden' imposed by the Fairness Doctrine requiring broadcasters to provide balanced coverage including controversial issues. They were now free to skew...

If living in harmony with the land is considered the Way of Beauty, then the Western mindset of conquering and taming nature is the Way of Ugly or the Way of Grotesqueness or some similar moniker built around an antonym of the Harmony...

I have been saddled with an angst for most of my cognizant life that I'm not where I am supposed to be thus can never realize the destiny of who I am supposed to be, to become. Despite knowing exactly where I am, I'm perpetually lost, seeking a phantom space that nourishes body and soul...

I rarely dream at night. At least, I recall very few nights swathed in dreams which does not mean I did not dream only that the awake and sleeping mind failed to connect unconscious dreaming to conscious awareness. When I do dream, it is extremely rare...

Every so often, I come across a mind blowing idea during my reading that completely alters my perception of life. Off the top of my head, I can quickly come up with three significantly impactful to how I perceive and conduct my life. The earliest I can remember occurred in High School when...

have a sick and twisted relationship with the concept of war. The twisted way it affects my soul leaves me sickened. On the one hand, I admire the valor of the combatants and the high ideals that sees a person put their life on the line to protect their comrades in arms on the battlefield. It is an act of self-sacrifice that is typically viewed through the lens of heroism. Being a bit of an adrena...

It seems all the rage to identify a GOAT, a Greatest of All Time, for athletes or others deemed exceptional in their arena, claims vociferously defended with myriad statistics. This is despite statistics being last in the increasingly false sequence of lies, damn lies, and statistics...

Growing up Catholic in the 60s and 70s, I attended parochial grammar and high schools. Prayer was required at various times, particularly on First Fridays of the month when we were dragged to mass. It was nice having classes shortened despite the tradeoff being less than invigorating. Prayers in mass were recited by the congregation in concert with the Priest or in response to the Priest acting as...

It is beyond my ken that anyone would deny trees have a heartbeat when the thump, thump, thump is palpable to anyone listening deeply with their soul. The same people, uneducated in medicine though they are, who will jump through hoops justifying an electrical blip on an oscilloscope screen is a cell blob's heartbeat, and refuse to raise a finger to protect our sentient brethren trees from dea...

My dog is currently a canine version of Schrödinger’s cat. I do not know if the thirteen-year-old Shih Tzu is alive or dead. She puked three days ago, stopped eating that night, then lost the ability to walk eventually suffering spasms like an alligator in a death roll....

I have been saddled with an angst for most of my cognizant life that I’m not where I am supposed to be thus can never realize the destiny of who I am supposed to be, to become. Despite knowing exactly where I am, I’m perpetually lost, seeking...

I have been hunting for decades but have never been able to bag my prey. There are no heads mounted on my wall, no high stories of stalking, wrangling, or capture. My quarry is illusory in the way the monster beneath my bed can be heard breathing raspy breaths but is always invisible to the eye except for an ephemeral glimpse floating on the periphery reflecting off dust motes hovering in shafts o...

One of my all-time favorite TV shows is the original Star Trek. Including an affinity for the subsequent versions showcasing iterations of the original characters, especially Mr. Spock. Recently, I sat down and watched an episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds where the crew intercepted a force that had them singing in a way reminiscent of musicals from the 1950s, with hidden emotions exposed to...

I spend what most people would consider an inordinate amount of wasted time writing words that will only ever be read by me. I have dozens of notebooks filled to overflowing with my musings many of which have made their way into the more than 4,000 blog posts published under three personas. Despite countless hours invested in my writing, I have not recouped a single cent from anyone...

I have been hunting for decades but have never been able to bag my prey. There are no heads mounted on my wall, no high stories of stalking, wrangling, or capture. My quarry is illusory in the way the monster beneath my bed can be heard breathing raspy breaths but is always invisible to the eye except for an ephemeral glimpse floating on the periphery reflecting off dust motes hovering in shafts o...

In the desert, you can't remember your name...and that's a good thing, the start of a most excellent journey. It means preconceptions are wiped away. It is in these vast expanses that I uncover, discover, recover a multitude of treasures, shiny nuggets of inspiration that either seed or weave their way into my musings, my paintings, my psyche. For me, forgetting my name is a stroke of luck...

My father died at 73 years old and was cremated releasing the energy of his body into the sky as smoke particles leaving behind only ashes and bits of charred bone. My mother took her last breath a month shy of her 85th birthday, was embalmed, and buried in a traditional coffin along with the urn holding my father's remains. Both now reside six feet beneath the earth's black surface in gol...

The Venus of Willendorf is believed to be one of the oldest carved representations of a god, in this case, a goddess. That distinction is silly because a self-manifesting god has no need for gender...

I cannot honestly say, in my entire adult life, I ever felt I belonged anywhere including in my own skin. As far as I know, I'm not schizophrenic nor do I suffer from any disassociative disorder. I don't belong in Chicagoland, the place I've been trying to escape from for 61 of the 62.5 years bounding my mortal existence...in my current incarnation...

Is it any surprise we are awestruck by ancient art lovingly painted in the deep recesses of dark caves? Or that some are willing to pay dearly for beautiful paintings, sculptures, and intact pottery discarded in a midden heap by indigenous ancestors? Or that an unknown nobody will invest countless hours immersed in the creative process knowing full well only they will ever be the audience for thei...

I have an acquaintance who is the life of the party magnet, has so many friends he is always invited somewhere, always on the go, an attendant at more weddings in 1 year than I've been invited to in my lifetime. It seems he has activities with friends to fill every waking hour. And then there is me...

Most of us have met a person, typically young, who we describe as having an old soul. It's a phrase used to describe someone who possesses qualities or characteristics or has a perspective deemed to be mature beyond their physical years...

I would like to think the tweet was sarcasm or written by a Twitter Troll...but I'm not so sure. To hear the legions thumping their holy book tell it, Jesús had flowing, cornsilk blond hair, eyes as blue as a noon desert sky, and skin so white it rivals that of those raised at the extreme outskirts of the vitamin-D deficient northern hemispheres...