Defeating the Dairy Demon: A Grocery Trip Lesson in Moderation
This afternoon, during a trip to the local grocery store, I discovered that sometimes your list may fail. Guys, it is okay to go off script from time to time. I pulled into the parking lot, and what did I see? Eight spaces near the door, open and…
Life in the Cardiac Cath Lab: A Healthcare Worker’s Journey to Cardiac Survival
Forged In The Flames of Oz Here it is Monday, 5:25 in the morning, and I work night shift tonight. There was a time when night shift felt almost sacred to me. The hospital halls would settle down, the noise would thin out, and the place would take on a…
Living in the Shadow of Cancer: An Honest Look at Survival and Loss
“This is the forest primeval, the murmuring pines and the hemlocks…” Wait. Are we sure this is how all great pieces of writing are supposed to begin? Over the past few months, I have tried my hand at prose. Well, writing. Let’s not get carried away and…
Mares Eat Oats
“Mares eat oats and does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy. A kid’ll eat ivy too, wouldn’t you?” Hi. My name is Wayne. I am sixty-four years old. And in this moment, I realized the kid is a baby goat. Not a child. Not some strange little ankle biter…
Snail Farts, Silver Cups, and Openus Wallettus
Somewhere between my coffee and my better judgment, my phone coughed up another miracle cure. This one was dressed real nice. It had ancient Egypt in one pocket, medieval Europe in the other, and enough confidence to make a used-car salesman blush. The…
I Took a Pandemic DNA Test. It Exposed a 57-Year-Old Family Lie
The pandemic was a political time bomb, an emotional nightmare, and a body count all at once. Those of us in healthcare were standing on the front line of something we did not fully understand yet. It was loud. It was severe. It came with arguments,…
Trying to Find Their Way Home
Pull up a chair. This one is being written by your old uncle, the one you rarely speak to, and that may be too bad because you might have missed something. He is a little strange, sure. Around here, we call him Disco Grandpa. He has been known to chair…
Balaam’s Donkey and the Road We Wanted
Sometimes the problem is not that the traditional lesson is wrong. The problem is that we have become too familiar with it. We hear “Balaam’s donkey,” and our minds go straight to the usual picture: stubborn animal, angry prophet, angel with a sword, and…
The Package Is Not Always The Problem
Somewhere along the way, food got loud. One crowd says everything in a package is poison. Another crowd says it does not matter as long as the label has the right numbers. Then somebody else walks in wearing a lab coat made out of opinions and starts…
Finding Your Way Home
Give me a partially washed-out dirt road with gravel on the side. Not a perfect road. Not a smooth road, or one of those polished streets with painted lines and lights telling everybody exactly when to stop and go. Give me the old dirt road. The one with…