My Cave My View

Trick Questions

Well, January really started out swell. My 401K is down, my cholesterol is up, COVID is gone crazy, and my too kind and loving wife has me on a diet. Any one of these could cause me grief and frustration but all of them together and I am not in the best of moods. It has been six hours now...

Acceptance and Praise

Everyone needs some amount of acceptance and praise. For years I have tried to convince my too kind and loving wife and her sisters that I am funny, witty, maybe even insightful and have mastered at least the basics of grammar. I suppose I didn’t get enough attention as a child and now I go about...

Grown-up words and redemption

I am sharing this excerpt from a 40-year-old journal; I was in college. On one hand, it is too personal and dredges up old unresolved anger and hurt. On the other hand, maybe there is another 11-year-old boy out there living with a parent that is an alcoholic or has an addiction of another sort....

Communication is key

It all comes down to communication. Good communication is the key to a happy marriage and getting the right Christmas present. To be sure, I don’t have the best track record when it comes to purchasing presents for my too-kind-and-loving wife. Two years ago, I got her a nice, monogrammed floor...

I’m thinking about retirement

I have to tell you that I’ve been thinking about retiring. But to be fair, I’ve been thinking about retiring since I started delivering newspapers when I was eleven. Back then, I remember thinking that I was excited to get a job and have money to travel the world and buy nice things. Soon I...

Three Green Berets and a bottle of bourbon

Occasionally people have enough self-awareness that they understand when something they are witnessing is bigger than themselves – moments such as when man stepped on the moon for the first time and September 11, 2001. Abe Lincoln had clarity of purpose and place when he used a mere 272 words in...

I’m solving the world’s problems

I am working very hard on solving the world’s problems when my too-kind-and-loving wife happens by, carrying a load of wash or something like that. To her, it appears that I am sitting on my big overstuffed chair drooling with my eyes shut and snoring. She shakes me to see if I am dead. Of course...

Cookies for Gino

I have lived long enough that I have experienced the death of loved ones and strangers; some expected, almost welcomed, the end of a long painful journey. Other times, tragically, unexpected. Their death felt like a blow to the side of my head with a sledgehammer. I know that birth and death are...

It is hot – Dang hot!

It is hot. Dang hot! I don’t do well in the heat. Okay, I’m a sweater. Like most people from Monticello, if it’s above 80 degrees, I’m complaining that it’s hot. So now that it’s near 100 degrees you can bet I’m sweating and panting like a fat dog after a run. So the circumstances are not ideal...

Epic failure of New Year’s resolution

Well, I might as well tell you all that I’m going to hell because someone stole my bucket of tools. I am not proud of it, but it can’t be helped. Let me explain my epic failure. This time of year is always special to me, mostly because I get to start a new year with the hope that this year I’m...