Category Archives: Memories

Memories, Minnesota, Mountains, Plants, Reimaging revelation, Travel

The Wild Life

January 27, 2026 Charles Leave a comment

Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Tuesday gratefuls: Sue Bradshaw. Shadow, bone crusher. Warming. A bit of Snow. Marilyn and Irv. Roxann and Tom. Jessie. Minnesota, leading the way. Non-violent resistance. Just folks saying no. Australia Day yesterday. On this side of the dateline. The Emirates. Saudi Arabia. Desert monarchies. Iran. Israel. Palestinians. Egypt. Jordan. Syria. Lebanon. Iraq. Kuwait.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Circle Route around Lake Superior

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity. Yetziratiut. “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Rachamim. Compassion.

While chesed (lovingkindness) often refers to a choice of action, rachamim is deeply tied to visceral emotion and empathy—feeling the pain of another.

Tarot: Page of Bows, the Stoat

Connection to Nature: The Stoat serves as a guide to help you reconnect with the sacredness of the ground beneath your feet

One brief shining: The wild streets where violence and dominance meet love and resistance, a reminder that our animal natures lie not far beneath the veneer of civilization, only waiting the right insult to emerge, leap the whole construct of ego and superego, let that id out to play.

https://www.duluthharborcam.com/p/canal-park-cams.html

Minnesota on my mind: There is a spot on I-35 heading north where your vehicle crests a rise and suddenly, in the interior of the North American continent, lies a huge body of water and two port cities, Duluth in Minnesota and Superior in Wisconsin. From that crest you can see the shipping canal visible if you click on the link above. A shipping canal! On a Lake.

If it’s summer, Lake Superior straddles the horizon, a blue reflection of a northern Sky. In winter the Great Lake might be frozen or might be, as it had been on this cam for several days, a scrim of slate gray with Water Vapor boiling off it.

I never tired of seeing Lake Superior just as I never tire of living in the Rocky Mountains. Different geographical features, yes, but equal in majesty and wonder. Twice I drove all the way around Lake Superior, 1,300 miles. The shoreline itself is 2,726 miles. A big Lake.

We live our Mayfly lives in the presence of miracles. Black Mountain. The Front Range. Lake Superior. You. Your friends. The Atlantic and the Pacific. The Mississippi and the Nile. Africa and Asia. Wild Neighbors like the Mountain Lion of Pacific Heights in San Francisco. Kangaroos and swooping Magpies.

See what you’re looking at.

Soul work: Is easy. Let no one fool you. No clergy, no self-help guru, no psychologist. All you have to do? See what you’re looking at. Hear the world around and within you. Let your hand brush over the coarse bark of a tree. Smell that Wood-burning stove. Or a Stargazer Lily. Taste your morning coffee and, in your mind’s eye trace back to the hand that dug the clay and the one who shaped the mug, the Coffee Tree, the Bean picker, the who dried the beans, who packaged them.

Then. Notice who saw. Who heard. Who smelled. Who touched. Who tasted. Really notice. If it was the One within who saw the miracle revealed by each sense, that’s your soul. If it’s not, repeat until it is. Easy.

Family, Far Right, Memories, Minnesota, Politics, US History

It’s Minnesota

January 16, 2026 Charles Leave a comment

Yule and the waning crescent of the Moon of New Beginnings

Friday gratefuls: Joe. Ruth. Gabe. College. Andover. Tulips. Iris. Anemones. Grape Hyacinth. Daffodils. Wild Roses. Wild Grapes. Borage. Sage. Thyme. Rosemary. Leeks. Garlic. Red Onions. The Firepit. The Woods. All the Dogs. Canning. Drying. Harvesting Honey. A life close to Mother Earth.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Joe

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity. Yetziratiut. “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Wholeness. Shleimut.

“The concept of shleimut extends beyond the individual, applying to relationships (finding a life partner with whom one feels complete) and the community (mending societal cracks to achieve collective creativity and flourishing).”

Tarot: Two of Vessels, Attraction

The Two of Vessels Wildwood Tarot asks us: In your life, what is attracting your attention? Is it worthy of your attention or a distraction?

One brief shining: “Goodnight, Joe,” I said; he returned, in words sweet to my one good ear, “Goodnight, Dad,” and in that familiar family ritual called back a childhood of stories and bedtimes, of meals at Mickey’s Diner, of playing catch in Irvine Park with the giant Oak as backstop, of silly plays and choral evenings, of attending Twins games, driving into St. Paul together.

Fathers and sons. Can go wrong. As it did with my Dad and me. Can be neutral as it is for some. Also can remain positive over all the years from first sight of that wicker basket to 44 years later. Joe was a stable, happy kid who made and kept close friends from elementary school through high school and college and in his work. Sang Yang. Zach White. Aaron Canner. David. Natcho. Jamie. Ken. Many others.

It makes my heart sing to see the man he has become. An excellent husband, a caring boss, a thoughtful person. A Godparent who actually had to step into that role. How he parents Ruth and Gabe, even from afar. A person in your life you can trust.

Just a moment: I know. I feel like I should be saying more about Renee Good. ICE in Minnesota. Still sorting through feelings of dismay, anger, sadness, pride. Dismayed that red tie guy’s brownshirts have descended on my old home ground. Angry that I’m not there to work with protesters, stand against this insult. Sad for Renee, her wife, her kids, her friends.

Yet also proud. I know Minnesota at a heart level. I know Minneapolis streets, parks, neighborhoods, people. I know the government and how it works. I know Renee’s death will not go unanswered by street politics. I know the state will investigate her death, even if the Federal Government tries to paper it over with lies and ignorant propaganda.

Will Ross be brought to account? If it was up to Minnesota’s Attorney General, Keith Ellison, I know he would be. Whether the complicated network of laws and jurisdictions between states and the Federal Government will allow that, I don’t know.

If any state in the country can stand against this abuse of Federal power, it’s Minnesota.

Aging, Ancient Brothers, Fourth Phase, Health, Memories, Mountains, The West

Glad I’m Old

January 14, 2026 Charles Leave a comment

Yule and the Moon of New Beginnings

Wednesday gratefuls: Joe, coming today. Dr. Josy. Healthy Shadow. Paying bills. Tom in recovery. Alan, too. The great American medical contraption. Books. Leads for books. Notebooklm. Pan. Lycaon. The enchanted world. Zeus. Athena. Hera. Poseidon. Hephaestus. Hermes. Hades. Arcadia. Ancient Greece.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Dr. Josy

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity. Yetziratiut. “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Wholeness. Shleimut. “The concept of shleimut extends beyond the individual, applying to relationships (finding a life partner with whom one feels complete) and the community (mending societal cracks to achieve collective creativity and flourishing).”

Tarot: Eight of Arrows, Struggle

“…profound personal struggles require calm, decisive and resolute action. Reach down into the very core of your being and summon all the reserves of your courage and wisdom. See honestly what the issue will require for you to resolve it…View this necessary sojourn with clear eyes and a resolute heart, for to overcome these tests of life makes us stronger.” Parting the Mists

One brief shining: Old age is an eight of arrows life phase, a time when the cycle of an individual life nears its end, yet also when a lifetime of contemplation and courage and love drives a personal distillation, the alembic of a lived life able to transform the dross of work and care into the golden fleece of wisdom and self-compassion.

Old age presents its insults. Those of us in our late seventies and eighties know. Could be maturing cataracts. Might be regrets. A certain hitch in the step. Maybe balance uncertain. All those family issues, good and troublesome. Of course, some sort of physical decline, could be serious illness.

Then there is the end of this story, once infinitely far away, now looming not far out of sight. Even with a death-friendly outlook, which I have, I’m still with Woody Allen: I’d prefer not to be there when it happens. Kate knows. Regina knows. Jon knows. Mom and dad know. All ancestors know. Death loves us all.

When I couldn’t open the jar of sauerkraut or the sour Cherry preserves, it hit me hard. Weak, so weak. When back pain constantly gnawed at my day, my composure, I let myself fall, often, into the slough of despond. Cancer’s various moments of deep uncertainty had the same power.

Yet. I’ve been reading. No surprise. My mind follows the threads of political change, for example, from a unique vantage point. One earned in years, decades of action and reflection. Or, as I research Pan, the great Arcadian God of the natural world, my heart and my imagination open up, seeing connections, linkages from other years of reading, learning.

Or, I have the insight, as I did yesterday, that I’ve stayed the course in many difficult situations: with Jon and his troubles, with Ruth and Gabe, with Kate in her final years, with so many Dog’s in their final weeks, with Shadow through our mutual angst. Even with myself.

Yes, old age has its insults. It sure does. It also has depth of compassion earned. Love emboldened and strengthened. Knowledge gathered, connected, created. A calm that comes from kicking the hamster wheel of achievement to the side. I’m glad I’m old. How bout you?

Memories, Music, Politics

We contain multitudes

January 11, 2026 Charles Leave a comment

Yule and the Moon of New Beginnings

Sunday gratefuls: Wild neighbors. Wilderness. The Wildland/Urban Interface. Going wild. That was wild. Wilding. Into the Woods. Fairy Tales. The Veldt. Hominins. Hominids. Australopithecus. Lucy. Neanderthals. Homo sapiens. Boundary Waters. Pukaskwa. Lake Superior. Isle Royale. Bob Weir.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Wild

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity. Yetziratiut. “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Wholeness. Shleimut.

Tarot: #1, The Shaman This was the result card for my Celtic Cross on New Year’s day. I feel an attunement with him. A sense of life purpose.

One brief shining: The Arapaho National Forest surrounds Shadow Mountain, just across Black Mountain to my southwest lies Staunton State Park, all sorts of Critters live in both of them, their daily comings and goings dictated largely, though not completely, by their wild nature.

Bob Weir died. Jerry Garcia a while ago. Levon. Robbie. Jimmy. Janis. Jim lies in a grave in a famous Paris Cemetery. Hit me today that as a generation ages so do the icons of youth. Bob made it to 78. We know that age, many of us I count as close friends.

As movie stars, novelists, members of the bands, poets, and athletes, spouses and friends begin to drop away, the world can seem paler, less than it was. Yet I find listening to Sugar Magnolia a magic carpet ride. Not back to the Sixties. No, they’re gone. To what then? To the person I am now,

The one whose heart still burns with a need for a just and loving world, whose voice can still sing the protest I feel in my chest when each piece of a world and a country I once knew gets taken apart, shelved or discarded. We don’t go backwards, life moves frontward in a way I don’t understand. Linear, when I want it to be, even believe to be, cyclical.

I wish the New Right understood this. Just because you resurrect gun boat diplomacy, imagine a world of homogeneity, enshrine Gordon Gecko as a prophet in your prosperity cult, and swagger astride the world like a drunken, ignorant colossus, doesn’t mean any of those things are good or true.

Many, perhaps most of us believe in our core that imperialism as policy died out decades ago. We also believe that our nation becomes richer in knowledge, cuisine, innovation when we embrace the other, not shun them. Greed is not good, as Gecko illustrates, it distorts values and priorities in inhuman and inhumane ways. We also know, as fellow passengers on spaceship earth that wild grabs for power: Venezuela, Greenland, the Nobel Peace Prize only delay the day when we learn what all kindergartners know. We need to share.

As I move closer to my last year in my 70’s, I feel confident that we will, in time, prevail. And when we do, we can put a little Hendrix on the headphones, some Janis, Stones, or The Band and remind ourselves of how we came to be the people we are now.

Memories, Minnesota, Politics, US History

Renee the Good. Is dead.

January 9, 2026 Charles Leave a comment

Yule and the Moon of New Beginnings

Friday gratefuls: Shadow, the awake. Cold night. Snow. Morning darkness. Light-headedness. Mussar. Altitude. Distracted. A bit dizzy. Working my scheduled review of newspapers, websites, podcasts. Doing further research on Pan. On the luparii. Reimagining Superior Wolf. Minnesota. Proud to have lived there forty years. Colorado. Proud to have lived here eleven years.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Minnesota

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity. Yetziratiut. “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Patience. Savlanut. “Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Tarot: Back at it soon

One brief shining: Rene the Good died at the hands of an ICE firearms trainer after another ICE agent had threatened her by trying to open the door of her Honda Pilot and shouting in her rolled down window, “Get the fuck out of the car.” As she turned her vehicle away to leave, she received a bullet to the head.

Don’t cry for me, Minnesota. The truth is I never left you. How I felt when I saw the familiar setting in Powderhorn Park. That maroon SUV parked diagonally on Portland. The so-out-of-place government provocateurs with masks-masks!-hiding their identities. ICE. A Trump militia spreading fear and chaos in American cities.

In Minneapolis. Wrong place to kill an unarmed woman. Minnesotans. Will. Not. Stand. For. This. The Federal government, Kash Patel’s oh so trustworthy FBI, took over the investigation. Minnesota’s criminal justice system would have arrested and charged the ICE agent with first degree murder. No wonder the FBI stepped in.

I would rather have local authorities investigating. Especially the state attorney general’s office. Though. Based on video and eye-witness testimony I don’t see any wiggle room. While Renee had disregarded an order, she turned her SUV away from the agents to drive from the scene. That’s clear from the video examinations done by the New York Times. There was nothing in her movements that warranted gun fire.

My heart leapt back into Minnesota on seeing this news. Became one again with the street level politics I knew so well there. Powderhorn Park has an active political community, many leftists, anarchists, co-op folks.

The glaring, searing contrast between masked agents of fear and the community oriented spirit of Powderhorn Park struck me forcefully, enough to make me gasp.

I don’t know how to say what I’m feeling. Minnesota and its politics of the common good has been my North Star. Flawed, sure. Full of humans. But there I found the arc of the moral universe bent a little further toward justice than most places I knew. Minnesota shaped me into the man I am now and I like who I am now.

This brutal, senseless killing shows the moral sinkhole that hate and bigotry have created in our national spirit. This is not how Americans are. Is it?

A shining city on the hill. A beacon to other nations. No longer. We will, if we have not already, become a pariah state, only engaged in actions in our perceived self-interest. Not my America.

Ancient Brothers, Cooking, Memories, Men, Minnesota, Myth and Story

Santas

December 29, 2025 Charles Leave a comment

Yule and the Moon of New Beginnings

Monday gratefuls: Cold Hafar. Mark invigilating. Cold night, good sleeping. Your favorite place. Mine is right here on Shadow Mountain. Ruth, skiing A-Basin. Gabe sorting through Jon’s art. Shadow’s last week in boarding school. Sue Bradshaw. Ana. Sheetpan meals. One of my own. Working out again. The Hummingbird.

Sparks of Joy and Awe:

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah: Gevurah strength, discipline

Creating Space: “Gevurah is the strength to create space and to hold space… it’s what helps us nurture our passions.” — Renee Fishman

Becoming a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Cutup the Spring Onions, added brightly colored strips of Bell Peppers, some Garlic, Olive Oil, Salt, Pepper, stirred them together to coat everything, all spaced evenly in one of my Nordicware quarter sheetpans, baked at 425 for ten minutes, then put Andouille and Italian sausages on top of them and baked 30 minutes more and soon I had at least five meals ready.

Cooking: Beginning to understand how to build my own sheetpan meals. Their virtue lies in their short prep, ability to accommodate diverse ingredients, ease of cooking, and limited cleanup. Just the sheetpan and whatever prep left over.

Once finished, I eat one meal right away, then portion out the rest in containers, pop them in the fridge, and I have my own meal service. Today I’m making Salmon fillets with baby potatoes and perhaps broccoli florets.

The nerve ablation has removed my back pain on my left side, so I can stand longer while prepping and cooking.

Still weak though, stamina sucks. I wanted to add sauerkraut to the sausage meal, but I’m too weak to open the f*!#&ing jar. Same with the Sour Cherry preserves I wanted to put on my toast. Geez. My modest goal is to get back enough grip strength to manage these simple tasks. I’m working on it.

Glad to be back in the kitchen, cooking for myself. I prefer my own food and the nerve ablation plus my new resistance work regimen enables me to get back at it.

Santa: Ancient Brother Mark told a great Santa story yesterday morning. Worth sharing.

When he lived in Marine on St Croix, Mark contacted a Santa to come for a pre-Christmas gathering at his house. Christopher was young, 3 or 4, and Mark invited a few other families with young kids. It was a Christmas party and the children had not been told Santa was coming.

After the party was underway, a pickup truck pulled up in the driveway and a man with a real great white beard got out, came around to the backdoor, and walked in, saying nothing. The kids stared.

Still saying nothing he went over to the fireplace and shined a flashlight up the fireplace chimney, checked the damper by opening and closing it.

“I’m one of the Santa’s.” he told the by now confused and wondering kids. “We have to go out and check chimneys to be sure Santa can get down them.” He went on to explain that there were many, many Santa’s. “Making Christmas happen is a big, big job.”

Mark and his friends tried to pay him, but he refused the money. “Don’t blow it for me, man. It’s for the kids.”

Memories, Minnesota, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate

Blowin’ In the Wind

December 18, 2025 Charles Leave a comment

Samain and the waning crescent of Shadow’s Moon

Thursday gratefuls: High winds. Mini-splits out. Generator on. Kylie, pain doc today. Shadow on her leash. Making progress at boarding school. Rachel, my Alabama gal palliative care social worker. Her Cat and her Christmas Tree. Trash containers stayed stable until pickup. 80433, my zip code, 98% effected by power outage.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Generator

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah: Netzach “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Becoming a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Winds have howled like lonely Wolves since yesterday morning, rattling windows, threatening to up turn trash containers and share our leftover stuff with our neighbors, predicted to last now until tomorrow, Friday, morning; the Wind wants to come inside, find a crack, a slightly open window, an unsecured door, a real force of nature.

On one sweaty Andover, Minnesota afternoon Kate and I sat at our long kitchen table, talking about how good the air-conditioning felt. Kate got serious. We need a generator. I knew what she meant. If the heat went out in a frigid Minnesota winter, Kate could cope. If the air-conditioning failed us because of our common summer Thunderstorms, she could not. A hot-blooded Norwegian gal, my Kate.

We gritted our financial teeth and bought a Kohl whole-house generator. These generators connect to gas lines and have automatic transfer switches that sense a power outage. The transfer switch turns on the generator and switches its output to the house’s electrical panel. Happy Kate. Happy me.

We got satisfaction out of being “on generator.” Its two cylinder engine’s thrum proof that we had made a wise decision. When we moved, I decided we’d take the generator along. Not easy, it had to be strapped to a pallet and lifted into the moving van by four very strong guys.

It got off-loaded to the garage and there it sat for over a year as I learned how to deal with a paucity of trades people in the mountains. Finally found Altitude Electric who agreed to install it. The generator sits today on the western side of the house, beside all the electrical panels and the transfer switch. Yes, up here all of the electrical panels live on the outside of the house. Surprised the hell outta me.

Yesterday around one p.m. I read on Next Door Shadow Mountain that one guy’s weather station had recorded a Wind gust of 116 mph. I found it hard to believe until I looked this morning at reports of wind speeds across the Front Range. Several in the 100, 102 range. So. Could be.

Around that time my lights flickered, my zoom call with Paul crashed and we had to switch to our phones to finish our conversation. Not long after I got off the phone, I heard that thrum again.

Hey, Kate. We’re on generator.

Dogs, Dreams, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Health, Memories, Politics

Again, Recess Is Over

December 9, 2025 Charles Leave a comment

Samain and the Shadow Moon (3 sessions to go)

Tuesday gratefuls: Shadow, doing her work. The now working Clinac. My life, worth living. Fencing companies. Building a dog run with heated dog house for Shadow. Joe’s willingness. Early Winter. The coming of Hannukah, Yule, the Winter Solstice, Christmas, New Year’s. Holiseason at its peak.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Fences

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah: Malchut Wonder. A feeling of surprise mixed with admiration caused by something beautiful or unexpected.

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Joe, my son, offered to come and build the dog run for Shadow, to set aside for a few days his serious duties and help Dad and his Dog, to do that after a fifteen hour flight from his home, a son a man can be proud of, yet I won’t let him come because this wonderful place where I live often experiences sudden, mighty Snowfalls and if one happened before or when he got here, he would have come 9,000 miles out of love and I would have no dog run. Doesn’t make sense for either of us. Damn it.

Shook off the OMG I make bad things happen feelings like Shadow shakes off rain. Still a little wet, but dry enough to feel ok.

When negative feelings crop up, they feed on themselves, multiply like Rabbits. This one begets another one and suddenly a whole life has come under scrutiny, memories retrieved to bolster the black mood.

When I drank, I often followed this spiral: I didn’t go to graduate school. I married stupidly, twice. I’ve not taken a direction in my life, rather let life carry me along like flotsam or jetsam. No agency. Woe is me and my sad, woe begotten life. And all because my mommy died young.

Nope. I’d been making choices all along. Many of them poor: Judy and Raeone, seminary. The Peaceable Kingdom. Not my woe begotten life, a Charlie begotten life that did not synch up with my values. No wonder I felt miserable much of the time.

After sobriety. Still plenty of work to do, to grab life in my own hands, shake it until it made sense, expressed who I saw myself to be. John Desteian helped me through it.

That dream. The pivotal one. I had a sword, held it high in the air over my head, lightning crackling around it while a crowd chanted, “He has the power. He has the power.” Yes, in fact I did and had had it all along. The power to change, to redirect my life.

And so I did.

Just a moment: Trump pardons convicted narcotrafficker, Juan Orlando Hernádez. Then, surprise! Honduras issues an arrest warrant for him for money laundering and fraud. Too bad for him Trump is not president of Honduras.

Now let’s play Where’s That Video? Oh, the guy it might indict has control over its release? OK. Will he at least release his actual orders, then? Like Federal Law requires? Again, recess is over. Time to pretend we’re adults now.

Dogs, Family, Feelings, Health, Memories

I have

December 8, 2025 Charles Leave a comment

Samain and the Shadow Moon

Monday gratefuls: Pictures of Shadow. Missing her. Darkness. Resolve. Football. Da Broncs. And, yes, always-the Vikes. The Nuggets. F1. Alexandria beats Anderson in the Wigwam (sic) 1963? Bobby Plump. The Indy 500. Jim Clark. A.J. Foyt. Mario Andretti and sons. Sports. The Atlanta Rabbits.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Gevurah

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah: Malchut Wonder. A feeling of surprise mixed with admiration caused by something beautiful or unexpected.

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Cleaned up the kitchen, unloading the dishwasher, putting dirty dishes in, a cycle, wiped down the counter, washed a sheet pan and a large bowl, poured myself a glass of eggnog, and sat on my stool as my porkchop, broccoli, and potato puffs warmed up.

Radiation starts up again today. I think. If the biomed engineering techs got it back up and running. Finishing Thursday, seeing Bupathi on Friday.

When I talked to Dr. Carter last Tuesday, he repeated what I keep hearing from various sources. “We’re treating your cancer like a chronic disease.” Hard to say how amazing this statement is. I’ve had stage 4 cancer since 2022 and he says it’s a chronic disease. Stage 4 has, historically, meant the end. And soon. Now, chronic disease. Wow.

On a sidenote. Don’t you think the Clinac looks like an adorable, goofy cartoon Dinosaur?

A curiosity: Have been unable to quash these wandering questions, maybe doubts, about my life. Am I a drama King? If everything’s running smoothly, something must be wrong?

Do I push situations in my life toward the extremes? After I quit drinking, I would have, up to this point, have said no. Even after divorcing Raeone and leaving the ministry, I felt strong, like I’d made necessary choices, not pleasant ones, choices to align my life with my values and beliefs.

Then, marrying Kate. We had this wonderful life together where we consistently made choices to support each other, family members in need, to support Mother Earth, to love and care for dogs. To travel the world together. Of course we had our differences, our troubles but we loved our way through them.

The move to Colorado, to be near the grandkids, extended that life into the Rocky Mountains. Where I got cancer. Where Kate got sick and died. Where all four of the dogs we brought with us died. Where I’ve now spent four and a half years in this wonderful home she found without her. Where back pain and a bad hip have left me less than able since Korea in 2023.

Then I adopted Shadow. 10 months ago. An up and down experience. As you, dear reader, already know.

I’ve written because I find writing brings me clarity, is the closest thing to true self-therapy I’ve ever found.

My conclusion, after having written this, looked back with I feel is honesty, I’ll answer my own question. These situations, especially since the move to Colorado, have been moments not of me pushing things to an extreme, but of me being forced by circumstance to confront and deal with real life extremes. Physical illness. Death. Mental illness. Grief. Jon and Jen’s nasty divorce, its fallout, then fallout from his death. Now the life of a dog I love wrestling with her own demons.

And, that’s ok. Life is as it happens. The key question is, do we show up to meet it there. I have.

Memories, Minnesota, Myth and Story

By the Shores of Gitche Gumee

November 30, 2025 Charles Leave a comment

Samain and the Radiation Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Cold. A bit of Snow. Shadow, the mystery dog. Rabbi Jamie. CBE. Joanne. Marilyn and Irv. Prostate cancer. Mayo. RMCC. Football. Vikings. Bears. Lions. Packers. Wu Wei. Taoism. Chuang Tzu. Lao Tzu. Mencius. Confucius. Emerson. Thoreau. Mary Fuller. Emily Dickinson. Hawthorne. Melville.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: College Football

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah: SERENITY Menucha Serene, carefree, literally “at rest/comfortable” “In Jewish tradition, ‘menucha’ (מְנוּחָה) signifies a profound state of spiritual and physical rest, tranquility, peace, and fulfillment, going far beyond merely ceasing work. It is a core concept tied to the Sabbath (Shabbat) and the ultimate spiritual destiny of the soul.” Gemini

Tarot: Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Look up to Ursa Major, the Great Bear, and follow the arc of his tail to Arcturus or the pointer Stars to Polaris, the North Star, cradling in your mind, if you can, the distances, so so far apart, and the backward clock those bright diamonds of light represent, your eye deceiving you telling you what you see is there, right there, when it might have been gone, dispersed, for a million years, leaving behind only its light still traveling because it must through the void of space and time. Like you, after death.

When Kate was alive, she did the crosswords. Two of them every morning. On paper, first in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, then the Denver Post. Because I got up early, I went out to the mailbox and collected the newspaper for her. That meant I saw the seasonal change of the Stars. Each late Fall I looked forward with anticipation to the return of Orion whom I consider a friend.

In Andover, Minnesota I would, too, often see the Northern Lights dancing over the Perlich’s house across from us. When Orion or the Northern Lights were in the sky, I would stop and watch, no matter how bitter the cold. We live in a world of wonder and sometimes it reaches out and grabs you.

Up here on Shadow Mountain Orion rises over Conifer and Black Mountain, trailing Starry memories of early Minnesota mornings and tales of the ancient Greeks, whose imagination informs, even now, what we see.

My friend Tom Crane and his wife Roxann went up to Duluth last Friday to celebrate Roxann’s birthday by the big Lake. I remember how many times Kate and I went up there, too. How every time, if the sky was clear, I would wander down from our rented town house to the rocky Shore and look out across the dark stillness of Lake Superior, a mirror to the night sky, catching the Stars.

By the shores of Gitche Gumee, by the shining big sea waters, all its ancient Glacial past reverberates. And not only its ancient past but also it would whisper in its somber voice a well-known folk song, the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

“The legend lives on from the Chippewa on downOf the big lake, they called Gitche GumeeThe lake, it is said, never gives up her deadWhen the skies of November turn gloomy…”