My dad was born on January 15, 1898. Yesterday would have been his 114th birthday. To my considerable surprise, he died in 1983. Up until about 1980, I really expected him to make it to 100. For one thing, he was never really sick. For another, he was still doing physically demanding labor even as…

The general over-the-top excitement bordering on mass hysteria that surrounds the turning of the calendar from one year to the next has always puzzled me. In fact, so un-into it am I that I am seldom awake when it happens. To me the whole cultural phenomenon is a vast waste of calories that could be…

There’s something about the start of a brand new year that tops off my hope reservoirs and makes me look forward to bigger and better things. Out with the old, in with the new. Not that last year was too shabby, mind you. I got speaking invitations from the four corners of the nation, the…