“Keep it for your children, your children’s children, and for all who come after you.” — Theodore Roosevelt A very important birthday is coming up this summer. The National Park Service (NPS) traces its origin to August 25, 1916, when President Woodrow Wilson signed the Organic Act. Today the NPS has 20,000 employees who manage
I don’t know of anyone who thinks a nightmare can be a good experience. It’s been a long time (fortunately) since I’ve had one, although I tend to have dreams where I either have to go somewhere or do something and I never quite make it. But if you’re unlucky enough to be haunted by
Nothing is as simple as it first appears. That’s my frustration with history — so much gets left out of the textbooks. I’ve just finished reading The End of the Cold War: 1985-1991 by Robert Service. It’s a very detailed, and heavily documented, account of the events leading up to the fall of the Berlin
I will never make it to the Olympics, even though athletically I’ve come farther than I’d ever hoped. (If you’d seen how I struggled in Little League, you’d know what I mean.) But I do share one trait with elite athletes — disappointment. It’s very discouraging to set your sights on a goal, particularly one
Are you about ready for a positive story? The background — I got an iPod several years ago to listen to when I run. I do have a modest music library, but mostly I listen to podcasts. One of my favorites is NPR’s “Radiolab”, which produces shows “about curiosity. Where sound illuminates ideas, and the
I have never been married (which is a whole another story), but I’m fascinated by some of the impacts being so close to another person for so long can have. The latest is an article entitled “Being Married for Decades Means That Your Bodies Become Biologically Alike” on the May 26th, 2016 edition of the
We all realize English is a dynamic language, constantly adding words and changing meanings. The most common definition of gay has completely changed in my lifetime, and google has been added as both a noun and a verb. (Yes, it was a word before, but as googol, the number 1 followed by 100 zeros.) But
We’ve been discussing medical care a lot in this country in recent years. But while catching up on reading over Memorial Day, I found a basic flaw in our healthcare system that everyone needs to know about. Let’s start with a question — how well do you know your doctor? What got my attention was
I hope everyone had a happy Memorial Day. Yesterday I mentioned how each generation seems to be associated with a war. History repeats, but not in the same way. The War on Terror and its related actions have been unique in that we have a peacetime home front despite vicious fighting in multiple locations. The
It seems every generation has a war. My father’s was World War II, as part of the “Greatest Generation”. Mine was Vietnam, not nearly as satisfying. Today it’s the war on terror. We have never been militaristic. We’ve always preferred to be isolationist with a small peacetime armed force. We prefer our wars short and