Close to my home in Eugene is a scene that stopped me in my tracks. On Columbia street there are railroad tracks of the tram that used to run there. In the middle of the tracks is a huge utility pole. The scene is funny because of its absurdity. The presence of the...

It was a bitter cold Colorado day, one of those days where you want to bundle up inside and watch the winter weather from behind thick glass. There was only one problem: I had committed myself to a run with my running buddy. Reluctantly I put on several layers of warm...

Who are your heroes? The word hero may conjure up an image of a superhuman wearing a cape who comes to the rescue of innocents under threat. I have a personal hero list with people that I admire and look up to. None of them wears a cape, but they don’t need a cape to...

In my class on research skills students practice oral presentations. One student gave a presentation that was hurried and unclear, the student spoke much too quickly, and the main message of the presentation was lost in the amount of detail shown. I was judgmental and...

My recent move from Colorado to Oregon involved getting a new driver license and new license plates. The photo shows my car with the old Colorado license plates and the new Oregon plates. On the one hand it was exciting to mount the new license plates, but taking off...

This is what my friend David said on our last run together before I left Colorado to move to Oregon. This move has been a time of goodbyes. There were tears and there was laughter. Saying goodbye to friends in Colorado was hard on the one hand, but it also warmed my...

My wife and I are moving from Colorado to Oregon. Most of our belongings are in boxes, we are taking care of all the things that need to be taken care of when selling and buying a house and going through an interstate move. This time feels chaotic and it is easy to be...

This is what my wife said to me as we were reading the newspaper in the morning. What she wanted me to pay attention to was an article in the New York Times that announced that Bob Weir had died. Bob Weir was the guitarist of the Grateful Dead. To be honest, I don’t...

Early in the morning I was waiting for my friend in a coffee shop for our regular get-together. My friend showed up late—which is not his habit—and he looked frazzled. He told me he discovered he had a flat tire as he parked his car, and now a parking inspector was...

Jess Rowe and Miriam Payne made history by rowing across the Pacific Ocean. When they decided to embark on this ambitious voyage, they may have had no idea how they were going to make this journey a reality. How could they get a boat that would carry them across? How...