Family

  • Sauntering Around Town

    I volunteered at Kiddie Park recently and ran the truck ride. A young staffer handed me a stopwatch and said “Three minutes per ride, and oh, here is a walkie talkie just in case it breaks down. It’s from Italy and the instructions are in Italian so, just saying.” What a fun time watching all…

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  • Like a Rock

    Like a Rock

    My daughter often sang along with television commercials when she was very young. She didn’t always get the words right. When the Chevy Silverado commercial came on, she sang, “Mike the Rock, ” a version I’ve come to prefer with apologies to Bob Seger. On a recent Sunday afternoon, we went to our lyrically challenged…

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  • Roger’s Library Books

    Roger’s Library Books

    I’m not such an unaware narcissist that I believe that I’m the only one Roger Hladky blessed in a powerful way. I was one among many.  It was long after Roger performed our wedding ceremony, his first to officiate. I was a father, my children grown and flown, an elder at our church back in…

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  • A Mother’s Gaze

    My life is now viewed through the lens of my children’s children. They call me Bubs. Karen and I spent this past week with Jenna, Andrew, and their newborn girl, Charlie Ann. This brought back memories of bringing home our daughter Lauren after a few days in the hospital. I remember thinking it incredible that…

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  • Karen and I decided to do something this summer that we had never done before. We rented an RV and drove through Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, and Colorado with our friends Bob & Sheila. Why? Perhaps this western wandering was a grasping after the nomadic ideal, a searching after stories about the land and…

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  • Last night we slept near Big Timber. I love the cathedral of woods, sunlight scattering through trees on a summer afternoon like smoking lasers. The maternal side of my family came from a misnamed place in the panhandle of Oklahoma, Boise City (Boise is tree in French) which was a lie propagated by real estate…

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  • RV two

    After two days of RV life, I’ve determined that this is not the life depicted in Downton Abbey and if Robert or Mary magically appeared and asked who will dress me today, well, I would tell them you are on your own. Serendipity arises and asks will you join. I said yes twice and no…

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  • Into the Woods

    Whenever I see a Slow Children at Play sign, I picture kids running in slow motion and I make a comment about children playing deliberately and my wife rolls her eyes. I’m just glad the idea is still alive. Children playing I mean, alone, away from adults, preferably not on streets but near streams of…

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  • The Naked Eye

    The Naked Eye

    Rain drips from the eaves of our cabin porch near Westcliffe, Colorado, as Led Zeppelin’s The Rain Song plays in my ear pods. It’s 60 degrees and the sky is electric as I gaze at the Sangre de Cristo Mountains rising like blue steel in the distance. The mountains whisper as I write, distracting me,…

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  • On the Road Again

    On the Road Again

    Dad always had a travelin’ jones. He loved maps, highways, vacations, travel. It was an itch that could only be scratched with a road trip. As Dad lay dying, he asked the logistical questions one asks when preparing for a journey. What time is it? Can we drive through for barbeque? Where are my children? …

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