In 1989, there were several reports of tourists being killed while visiting game parks in Kenya. When people found out that we were about to travel to Africa, they asked with alarm, “Should you really go?” Read More

When people ask me where I’m from, it gets complicated.  I say, “Well, we moved around a lot.  I grew up mostly in Michigan.”  However, Michigan was just where my nuclear family lived on and off when not overseas, there were no relatives nearby, and we moved away before I finished high school.  In fact,… Read More

You can see a great distance from the Great Wall of China at Mutianyu.  The view is quite spectacular as it winds along the crests of the mountains, rolling up and down with the terrain; the wide path at the top of the wall turns into irregular stairsteps to accommodate the undulations and is punctuated… Read More

In the universe of trauma, it seems pretty trivial to describe a childhood horror movie.  Looking back now, it is hard to believe that I would be terrified by the old sci-fi low-budget 1950’s film, “The Blob”.  I was surprised to learn from Wikipedia that it was Steve McQueen’s acting debut, and music was by… Read More

It was our friend Jack who recommended Aidan to us. We needed someone to paint the house interior, and he assured us that Aidan was the best.  He was also an artist, a perfectionist, and a quixotic Irish fellow who presented us with a four-page estimate in hand-written calligraphy.  Yes, he was available, and yes,… Read More

It was the dark winter solstice of December 2020.  Everything was shut down because of COVID, and vaccines were a mere glimmer.  Life was suspended.  Work had stopped abruptly one day in March—I was too old to risk showing up in person, and virtual options were poor—so de facto retirement came more suddenly than I… Read More

There was a phone with buttons for hold and intercom, and a blocky computer console sitting squarely in the middle of the desk.  I think it was a Dell.  The font was clunky and there were no graphics.  This was my first computer.  Read More

We were put on a bus, blindfolded, and driven around country roads this way and that.  At some point, groups of four were let out of the bus, given a map, and told to find our way back.  We were all fifth graders in East Lansing public school and this was part of the curriculum… Read More

Although I don’t look forward to going to the dentist, I do appreciate the importance of the work–maybe because I have always had dental issues, from cavities to crowns, partial plates and bridges to implants, orthodontia to tooth extraction.  Much of it is thanks to genetics, which forgot to provide me a full secondary set… Read More

We were looking for somewhere to buy a boom box to play CD music for our elopement ceremony in Niagara Falls, and someone suggested Canadian Tire.  Incredulous, we had to ask why an automotive service center would have such a thing and were met with an amused look and explanation that the store carried much… Read More