P u t t i n g   I t   I n t o   W o r d s  ~  Essay Exhibit

Back in December of 1959 I was an unemployed sign painter who'd just married a woman with two small kids. We moved to Fullerton, California, because Elaine's married sister lived there and we thought maybe she could help with baby-sitting while Elaine worked as an RN. But this idea never came to pass.

I couldn't find a steady job, so Elaine decided to pass out cards to all the downtown Fullerton stores, in hopes of getting me some work painting "Merry Christmas" messages on their windows.  Read More . . .

I've always prided myself on even-temperedness and congeniality in the face of hard times. What little wave of middle age could hold a clichéd candle to four hip replacements, a shoulder revision, an above-knee amputation, and enough surgeries to keep the local orthopods in new BMWs for the rest of their natural lives? I asked that question for forty-six myopic years and promptly ate my shorts for lunch. The answer, of course, is menopause.  Read More . . .

Forget "fight or flight" as the only duo of responses in the face of stress. For women, there's a third response: "befriend." A landmark UCLA study turned five decades of stress research on its head with the revelation that a cascade of brain chemicals gives women a larger behavioral repertoire when confronted with stress. The hormone oxytocin is released as part of the stress response in women. It controls the fight/flight response and, instead, encourages her to tend children and gather with other women.  Read More . . .

Some kind soul recently pointed out that Bill Gates is responsible for 98.9% of the disruptions that are slowing things down for everyone but him and a few mountain climbers and frog-people whose laptops are still on order. (Hunting for socks hidden by clothes driers accounts for another half a percent.) I knew I was working slow, but I thought it was my fault. I know it is hard to believe.  Read More . . .

Have you come to realize that life is really one near myth after another? Just take a look around life and consider all that we have almost mythed. To achieve continuity in my attempt at nearly mything as much as possible, I have created my own set of muddled archetypes to provide an un-mythable orderliness. We must engage in an entertaining vision in illo tempore, which I cogitate upon as the puddles.  Read More . . .

Since the escalation of international terrorist activity a few years ago, many of us have had an opportunity to re-evaluate relationships and reflect upon our lives. This can be a very difficult, and sometimes wrenching thing to do, but a necessary activity. Making this sort of emotional assessment takes us back to our core values. It helps us to appreciate the people who have touched our lives in positive ways.  Read More . . .

A few years ago, I had the privilege of meeting Stephen McDonald. Some of you may have heard of him. He is a New York City police officer. One summer night nearly two decades ago, someone among a group of young people shot him in Central Park and left him paralyzed.

Why do I mention him now? Well, he uses his misfortune to teach people-especially children-about accepting people as they are. Some people have used the fact that his shooters were African-American teenagers to justify racial profiling, or simply to rationalize their own prejudices.  Read More . . .