Nation

  • Trains, Plains & Peanuts

    The remains of my Father-in-law were scattered to the four winds from atop Bowman’s Hill Tower on the Pennsylvania side of the Delaware River. Thomas Mason’s children loved this family getaway place near the spot where George Washington crossed over to Trenton, New Jersey on Christmas night in 1776. George Washington became our first President…

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  • Restless Bones

    There’s an old saying spun different ways but the essence is, “If you aren’t an insurrectionist at eighteen, you have no heart. And if you aren’t a flag-waving patriot at thirty-five, you have no brain.”  This seems truer as time goes by. In my youth, as the Star-Spangled Banner was played at sporting events, I…

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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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  • RV 7 .  Coming Home: These are the Days

    We have wandered the west lassoing Wyoming, and taking in OK, KS, NE, SD, ID, and CO. My Dad loved wandering vacations so he took his teenage brother, his parents and three Taylor children and drove the eight of us to California in a Chrysler Imperial that looked like a batmobile. My dad had always…

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  • RV three

    RV three

    When one wanders, one should still be keen enough to know when to continue wandering in a particular direction or when one’s fate is in jeopardy. That may come through the assistance of maps and guides. It may come through the assistance and reliance on God and dear friends. It may come through seeking wisdom…

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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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  • The Winter of Our Unsettled Season

    It was a tough year to be human in 2020. I mentioned this in passing to our cat, Boo, and she looked at me with cold green eyes, blinked, and walked away unfazed by the concerns of her bipedal servant. Oh to be so carefree. Alas, I’m feeling more Jimmy Buffett these days when he…

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  • Waiting All These Years

    I’ve been thinking about Dooney lately. He was 5’10” about 175 lbs…just like me only he was black. I guarded him in practice. He could shoot it and he could get in your face and shut you down. Although he didn’t look tough, a bit paunchy for a high school senior, he was tough as…

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  • March 28, 2020

    March 28, 2020

    My wife turned off the television and said to our eldest child, “Go upstairs and write down your feelings. One day you will look back on this day and be glad that you did.” Our eleven-year-old daughter went to her bedroom to ponder what she had seen that horrific Tuesday, September 11, 2001. She came…

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  • The Color of Water

    “Nothing has done more to bring people of different races and different backgrounds together than athletics, certainly more than politicians have done. It’s why the Greeks invented the Olympics” Mike Leach, Washington State Football Coach Coach Leach is probably wrong about the 2nd part, but the 1st part rings true, at least in my experience.…

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