The Great Egg Hunt

We hurry to find the best of the eggs,
before our opportunity passes us by.
We wallow in the filth, face in the mud.
We scratch our way past each other,
for our chance at the reward.
When all is said, when all is done,
the final tallies are spoken.
As always, all of my eggs are broken.

Drivers Diaries

Hope Road

Driving on a Saturday noon learning Spanish from a couple of Scots, I pass a white pony wearing a blue jacket. And sun dances on the Flat River in a late winter thaw while poplar trees cast their grand shadows across the road. There is a pontoon boat anchored on the shore of a watering hole in a field where cows graze.

Here the trees are nomads that stayed in one place too long. The roots grew up through their feet and anchored them, immobile for eternity. As the wind blows, they moan. Longing to be free. Birds nest in their outstretched arms and whisper stories of their travels in the nomad’s ear.

The sun sets on another winter and electric blue clouds look down on the pony in the blue coat, the cows grazing, and the beached pontoon.

The dusk pushes me on through these mid-Michigan towns. Past the husks of rotted old cars that litter the landscape, where there are more abandon homes than chances to live the American dream. All this along the road called Hope.

Drivers Diaries

Social Interaction

I walk out of a place and do the awkward excuse-me-two-step with a woman walking in
I look her in the eyes, smile kindly, and say excuse me. She looks past me, making no effort to be polite.

It is like this too often. And I know why so many people hate. I am angry too. Not understanding why I shouldn’t be worthy of manners.

Seconds before my little enlightenment, I had thought she was beautiful. Elegant.
Now her mask was pulled away, her ugly nature shown to me. And I wonder; how many of her friends never see this reality that she is?

The Intellectual Devotional; Revive Your Mind, Complete Your Education, and Roam Confidently with the Cultured Class.

If you are anything like me, and I hope you are, you have often said to yourself, ‘self, I wish there were a way to study all things brainy the way that most people study religion’. Well, your scholarly prayers have been answered. David S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim have put together a volume of daily lessons from seven fields of knowledge that follow a weekly regiment. Monday is History, Tuesday is Literature, Wednesday is Visual Arts, Thursday is Science, Friday is Music, Saturday is Philosophy, and Sunday is, of course, Religion. It is, in essence, a quick course in things your really ought to know like the education and reign of Alexander The Great.

David S. Kidder is an entrepreneur that has founded many cutting edge companies in the information age and served as Vice-President of THINK New Ideas. Oppenheim has a well-established career as a journalist in print and television and is currently the senior producer of NBC’s Today show.

The layout and construction of this book is such that it allows the reader to take in these facts as well as take time to let them sink in. For example, when you read about melody and the structure of music Friday morning, you have the whole day to think about it and at a single page per day it doesn’t bog you down with too much to remember, then the information will be well absorbed into the gray matter until it is needed at a cocktail party where you can wow the bosses wife or bore the obnoxious guy from sales. This makes for a wonderful experience in learning that will take even the most tired of minds and revive them with the power of ammonium carbonate. In addition to the body of the daily essay there are footnotes that are sometimes humorous and always supportive of the main idea. If my high-school English teacher judged it, an A+ would be emblazoned on the cover.

The Intellectual Devotional is perfect for everyone. You don’t have to be a Ph. D. to want to read this book; you just have to like learning.
David S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim biographical information courtesy of www.intellectualdevotional.com

Public Service Announcement

"That which does not kill us only makes us stronger."

To Whom It May Concern:

While you were sitting at your desk questioning my work ethic I was:

Taking care of a puppy.
Taking care of a dog.
Taking care of a house.
Taking care of my spouse.
Taking care of business.
Taking in 180 reps of heavy weights.
Taking out my frustrations on a heavy bag.

Thanks for the motivation.