Giving Bounces Back
Last weekend, about 4,000 people attended the NW Marine Art Works Open Studio event in Portland. Oregon. I opened my studio (number 55) with a collection of paintings and drawings that I had finished over the past year or so. Each one was painted or drawn...
Becoming what I will be when I die.
It was been a some time since my last article—it was April, 2022. I have not been sitting idly by—rather I have been surviving (and enduring) the transformation of our society; working on my art; and spending time with my family. I have been observing the decay of our...
Forgivness and Transformation
A few times a week, on my walks, sitting alone or contemplating my next brush stroke, I think about my past transgressions over these +73 years. They range in consequences from minor to major. They involve friends, family and others that I barely knew. As I reflect...
Transaction (less)
For nearly 50 years, I was active in business. It was both exhilarating and, at times, grueling. It was also rewarding—given that our work created a better place for people. Now that I have slipped through the gauze separating commerce and life, I can see more clearly...
What We Learn from Hate
I was raised to not embrace hate. My mother was a fervent Southern Baptist who knew Bible verse by heart. Often her admonishments to me, for my pesky or bad behavior, was quoted scripture. She also was, I believe now in retrospect, always consistent with her actions...
Mental Retreating
For most of my professional life, I spent every waking moment thinking about how to grow our company; make significant architecture; improve people's lives; and avoid loss. It was never easy but was also not overly tortuous. It was fun and I had the energy, drive and...
2021>>2022
It has been a year since I last posted an article to my site. That is the longest time between articles since I began posting. What a year. We finished our beach house after nearly 2 years. The constraints on labor and materials severely impacted our budget and...
2020 + WON = 2021
In this, my first article for 2021, I have to address the sadness lodged in my corpus. January 6, 2021 was an inflection point and the culmination of 48 months of incitement by DJT. His rapid fire and continuous and inciting tweets provided all of the fuel that the...
Thoughts on 2020 and beyond
As 2020 comes to a close, I thought I would make my last post of the year about this eventful and bizarre year. All of us have experienced 2020 in different ways. For me, this year has brought revelations and important moments for learning about the world around me...
Taking the long way…
When I was a kid and working on my homework, I had a habit of asking mom how to spell a word. She was adamant that I look up the word. I don't recall her ever helping me in that way. After a while I got so used to looking up the words that it became a pleasant...
This too will pass
The last several weeks have been trying ones. First we were locked down by Covid (and still are). Then came wildfires that generated millions of cubic feet of life threatening smoke, killed dozens and wiped out the homes of several 1,000 families as well as the...
Notorious RBG
Today, at 4:50PM PST I saw a news flash on my phone that Ruth Bader Ginsberg had just died. It felt like cosmic punch was thrown into my gut. Besides her lauded intellect and service to justice, I just really liked her spunk. I will not repeat all of the...