Recovery. Sobriety. Living Wise.
In 1864, during the height of the Civil War, a Union soldier named William McCarter found himself dying of dysentery in a crowded military hospital. The man who nursed him back to health—who fed him, cleaned him, and sat with him through the worst nights, was a Confederate prisoner of war. Mercy knows no enemy. Two men who, by every measure of their time, were … Continue reading Who Would Ever Have Thought?
Woodrow Wilson observed, “If a dog will not come to you after having looked you in the face, you should go home and examine your conscience.” I had an opportunity to examine my conscience a number of years ago on a trip to Bloomington, Indiana to visit Marsha’s parents. It was there I was introduced to a Yorkshire terrier named Dusty. Dusty was a straightforward … Continue reading Living in Your Own Skin
After my recent post on toxic masculinity I found I was drained to the bone. I kept asking myself — how in the name of God will we ever survive ourselves? And then, as so often is the case, I remembered something Abraham Lincoln once said: “The mystic chords of memory… will yet swell…when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of … Continue reading Finding Our Better Angels
“If we are going to use history for our pleasure and amusement, we must also use it for the education of the people; and if we are going to distort history to suit our own ends, we must remember that the truth will always come back to haunt us.” ~ W.E.B. Dubois One person who was haunted by the history of his time was President … Continue reading A Prayer For My Country
During my 40 years of sobriety I’ve been engaged in an ongoing conversation with the Creator on all manner of topics. To me it has seemed like a long, extended prayer where, even now, I haven’t yet gotten to the “AMEN” affirmation. — So I continue to write. This week I’ve looked back over years of posts and I asked myself — what jumps out? … Continue reading A Mountain Prayer