Encountering a stranger who knows more about your life than he should is eerie. Well, I don’t mean to startle you, but I do know a private fact about you. I know that you are weighing up a decision in your life.
To be sure, I do not know any details. I have no idea whether [...]
Archives: Thought Tools
Go For It
Retreat to Advance
Have you ever experienced intense frustration trying to recall something?
Perhaps it is the name of someone you want to call. Sometimes it is a tune that is dancing around your mind just out of memory’s reach. There was an item that my wife asked me to pick up at the store. “Write it down so [...]
The Pilgrims and Rosh HaShana
Rosh HaShana, the start of the Jewish year 5770, begins on Friday night. There could hardly be a more appropriate week to discuss the Pilgrims.
Those who sailed on the Mayflower were deeply religious and Biblically knowledgeable Christians. So it is astounding that in setting up the Plymouth Plantation, they agreed to an arrangement with their [...]
Feeling Lucky, Punk? Thought Tools
I misquote. In his 1971 classic, Dirty Harry, Clint Eastwood actually said,
“You’ve got to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya punk’?”
How about you? When things seem to be going your way, from finding a new job to meeting a potential mate do you marvel at your luck? When you lose [...]
Life Happens—Not
In malls from San Antonio to Santa Monica expensive retailers like Neiman Marcus, Tiffany, and Bloomingdale’s are opening new stores. That suggests many customers with money to spend, yet we all know legions of debt-strapped people struggling to keep their noses above water.
Looking at the economy, it is easy to see that some people are [...]
Star Struck
I bumped into Maria Shriver—literally. I was entering the office of a New York publisher just as she was leaving. I apologized, we wisecracked for about ninety seconds and she was gone. I told quite a few people about it. Then a sobering thought struck me. I’m certain she did not mention our encounter to [...]
He Knew Her – Or Did He?
My parents were classical music enthusiasts so I grew up familiar with the works of many of the great composers. Had you asked me, I would have said that I knew Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, the Pastoral. Then, a few years back, my son-in-law Max directed me to an audio program in which a wonderful music [...]
DEATH BY LONELINESS
Twelve women shot in a fitness center
by a man the New York Times called
“…tortured by loneliness.”
Thirty-two victims shot at Virginia Tech
by a man the New York Times described as
“…consumed by a troubling silence.”
Thirteen people killed in a Binghamton social center
by a gunman the same newspaper labeled
“…an introvert who was secretive in the extreme.”
Murder is an [...]
Angel On A Motorcycle
Have you ever been in a situation where you found yourself calling on your guardian angel? If you’ve seen active military service, I probably know your answer. Most who have experienced danger answer in the affirmative. This is hardly surprising.
A 2008 Baylor University study showed that more than half of all Americans claim to have [...]
Do You Remember?
Memory is among those easily overlooked gifts for which we ought to offer up daily gratitude to God.
Without memory, one is isolated from others. But even worse, one is isolated from oneself. Without memory, life is a disconnected sequence of thinly sliced moments of time. It is memory that stitches together those instants, compiling them [...]
