• Daily Life,  I Never Thought I'd Be In This Situation,  Music,  Reflections

    Not Sure Whose Will Be Done

    I’ve long detested men who cultivate trademarks and eccentricities. Far too many in my past and present who wear garish socks, or inappropriate hats, or bizarre haircuts or outlandishly-sculpted facial hair, or a certain color of clothing every day (because the world needs more Johnny Cashes), or who steeple their fingers when offering their ninth-hand opinions, or who fondle pipes and cigars because a certain professor did so, or who carry hundred-dollar water bottles snapped onto their noncombatant and too-wide hips. It’s one thing to have a natural quirk; many men have them. But to read the biography of a famous or infamous man and then affect an eccentric mannerism…

  • Daily Life,  I Never Thought I'd Be In This Situation,  Reflections

    Mountains To Moors

    When I arrived at work this morning, I had to stare for several minutes at the dark beauty I saw before me. The lights in the parking lot gave fire to the orange and red ornamental maples ringing the lot. Goblins had come along in the night and stuck Poe’s flambeaux into the mulched earth and left them to burn until the sun returned to chase away the effect. Walking to my building, I heard two young men near a car talking. I winced at the tone and content of their words. It’s not an original observation to say that today’s males are not….well, men. There is a hideous softness,…