Jan 5New Year Strategies for IntrovertsWe can’t keep doing this the way the extroverts do. If you are an introvert like me, right about now you are utterly knackered. Since roughly Halloween, you have been pummeled by demands and invitations, events with families, friends, and coworkers, madding crowds, and a relentless cacophony of bright lights…Introvert7 min read
Dec 31, 2021Turning OverNew year. New you? Every year at this time I get out my journal, or some other sort of writing materials, and do a review of the past year, and make some plans for the next one. Needless to say, that process was… interesting last year, and feels eerily similar…New Year3 min read
Apr 1, 2021“The Talk” is a Process, Not An EventWhen I was growing up, in the context in which I grew up (in the 1970s and 1980s, in an area of lily-white folks of mixed economic class), if someone used the phrase “the talk,” they were referring to the one about sex. You know the one. In that time…The Talk6 min read
Jan 10, 2021America, Make a Constitution Saving ThrowPlease stop saying “this is not who we are.” My title is a pun on a Dungeons & Dragons term, for readers who may not be familiar. A “saving throw” is a die roll you make in response to an attack, to discover how much damage has been done to…4 min read
Dec 2, 2020The Sheltered HarborA reflection on Christmas from a Unitarian Universalist I wrote a sermon for my UU congregation in 2017, for the first Sunday of Advent. What follows here is that sermon, with a number of updates and adjustments for the state of the world in 2020. …Unitarian Universalist11 min read
Oct 31, 2020Kitchen ReflectionsA much-needed total departure from current events Like most everyone in America who is actually paying attention right now, I am exhausted, enraged, and deeply in need of a change of scenery. …Cooking4 min read
Jul 9, 2020Stones and WallsA sermon delivered to Mosaic UUC on June 28, 2020 “We all had a collective feeling like we’d had enough of this kind of shit. It wasn’t anything tangible anybody said to anyone else, it was just kind of like everything over the years had come to a head on…LGBTQ10 min read
Jun 12, 2020Defund the PoliceA radical, unapologetic, immodest proposal The phrase “defund the police” is getting a lot of traction around the country, and predictably, a lot of people are freaking out about what it means. Republican pundits are making sure that mild-mannered soccer moms believe it means total anarchy and the downfall of…Defundthepolice4 min read
Jun 11, 2020Love Doesn’t CareA sermon delivered to Mosaic Unitarian Universalist Congregation, May 17, 2020 Along my journey to becoming a leadership coach, I learned a lot about how people’s brains work. Of course brains are pretty complicated, so there are people who make whole careers out of translating the complexity of brain function…LGBTQ6 min read
Jun 8, 2020Tony Robbins is Right About ChangeAnd that’s the problem. A few days ago I wrote this story about my experience with a conservative white male politician. And I confessed in that story that although I fiercely disagreed with almost every word that came out of his mouth, and indeed found myself in full-on fight-or-flight fury…Racism7 min read
