Suprise Me

Stephanie and Me,  circa 1965 Posing for the Camera  Before we all took selfies on our cell phones,  and before  “BFF”  and “besties”  were entries in the Urban Dictionary,  Stephanie and I were best friends posing for pictures in a neighborhood photo booth.   We were practically inseparable then and I’ve written before about our… Read More

It’s all over the news. You might even be sick of hearing about it by now. Just one word: Wordle. Well, actually up to six words. Five-letter words. But only one word wins. A different word every day, the same word for everyone. In the world. Free. (For now.) And you can only play once… Read More

The great river of class, culture and convictions afforded me a way out. Read More

No one had ever gotten married at the station before. Read More

I learned the freedom of flying the day my mom let go of the bike. Read More

In preparing him, Dad emphasized, “Jake, they don’t want to know your philosophy on life. They want to know what you would do as a driver in different situations.” J Read More

The Troubadour  I’ve written about my childhood summers at my grandmother’s small Catskill hotel.  (See My Game Mother and My Heart Remembers My Grandmother’s Hotel)  Here’s another memory. Once or twice every summer when I was very young,  an elderly man whom we called the Troubadour came to the hotel to spend an evening entertaining the guests… Read More

Now, I’m starting to know how my mother felt about tech support — dazed and confused. Read More

My mother was our Blue Bird leader. As such, she went out of her way not to show favoritism…so much so that when we put on a little production of the Pied Piper of Hamlin, I was cast as one of the rats. Read More

I had just returned from a tour of Alaska with a rock and roll band. It was June, 1980 and we were about to descend into the Reagan Era. The glow of the late 1960s had contracted into the dire and apocalyptic 70s and promised to flow headlong into Iran Contra. Our friend Carmelita, one… Read More