First Contact Three years and ten hours ago I still worked for Uncle Sam. I heard the news just before bedtime, and I called the Boys and told them it had begun. Then I went to bed, which seemed appropriate after having warned my children to be extra alert. At that time I had every […]

High Power I am not in synch with time in the Middle East. Events there come at me fully blown and contextualized by others. Being human, and thoroughly relative, my default values are set for the horizon around me. Despite all evidence to the contrary, I still tend to think of the here-and-now as being […]

I wore the green sweater. It took a little searching to find it, since it was right where I left it a year ago. I slipped it on, and it was a little tighter than I remember. But that seems to be the way of things, clothes shrinking mysteriously in the closet when you don’t […]

My grandfather Mike was the last full-blooded Irishman in the family, and his grandfather may have been the first of the family to land on these shores, leaving the forty shades o’ green behind, or the fields that still grew the wheat to make bread for the English table, even as the potatoes took the […]

Ides of March The wind is roaring outside, the Lion contesting with the Lamb, and kicking his butt. Wispy clouds are scudding across the face of the full moon that gleams with the reflected light of the coming dawn. Beware the Ides of March. The Latin word “Ides” means “to divide.” Each month of the […]

It was glorious looking down from the balcony. The men who use the feeding program at the church across the street came at the appointed hour, mostly Hispanic, though not all of them. They seemed to glory in the warmth, strolling back toward the garden apartments, lighting up cigarettes and laughing at the wonder of […]

In one of my last official missions for the government I was to lead a delegation to a prominent south Asian nation. I was not the best qualified person to do it, but the assignment had been a bit of a hot potato, and no one else wanted to do it. I volunteered, and with […]

Spring Cleaning Gale Norton, Secretary of the Interior Department, has decided to spend more time with her family and resigned. Claude Allen, senior domestic policy advisor to the President, has decided to spend more time with his family, too. He has not resigned as of this morning, but I expect that to come tomorrow. I […]

There is maybe rain coming today, and my ears are pricked up about it, since I am driving from Washington to the north, through Baltimore and Philly and Wilmington and into the Garden State, paralleling the railroad tracks. I prefer to ride on the train, but going up late in the day that would require […]

Good as It Gets This morning, in this place, is the best that will be. Empires rise and fall, ice advances and withdraws. The fabric of the earth itself rends and lava flows. Weaving our small lives into the warp and weft of such a mighty tapestry is daunting, but the loom creaks on. We […]