This morning, at approximately 6:00 a.m., I fell while attempting to make my way to the bathroom. The position I landed in - because of my Congestive Heart Failure - made it almost impossible to breathe. After activating the emergency pendant I wore around my neck, I knew my top priority was to get my [...]
In June 1968, I attended my high school's senior prom. My date was Joan, the Captain of the school's cheer leading squad. Frank, my best friend and Dariel, his long time sweetheart, also attended. My father had agreed to let me use his new Oldsmobile Delta 88 - with its camel leather interior, power [...]
My mother, who is now 85 and living in a skilled nursing facility, told me a story when I turned 60. She said that in 1972, when I was 22 and living in a monastery in California, she walked into the kitchen of her home in upstate New York one day and found herself in [...]
Thirty-nine years ago I spent Christmas Eve with 25 Nubian and Alpine goats in a barn I helped build at a Soto Zen Buddhist monastery in Mount Shasta, California. Earlier that day, Haryo and I (Haryo was a senior monk who taught me - among other things - the strategic value of buying Craftsman tools [...]
... FROM RICH WHITE MEN WITH TINY HEARTS WHO LIVE ON GLACIERS OF AMBITION About two months ago my doctor told me clearly and emphatically, "You've been in a wheelchair for more than 15 years. This has not been good for either your legs (which are badly swollen and discolored) or your heart (which is enlarged [...]
I don't pretend to have the faintest idea what the 20-year-old was thinking as he pulled the trigger over and over again at a Newtown, Connecticut elementary school. No one except Lanza does, and in his final act as a human being, he made it clear he was in no mood for a round table discussion on [...]
John Gribowich3/29/1935 - 12/05/12 Just do the steps that you've been shown By everyone you've ever known Until the dance becomes your very own No matter how close to yours Another's steps have grown In the end there is one dance you'll do alone -Jackson Browne I remember the first time [...]
Last night a dear friend of mine dropped his 97-year-old body on the floor and ran off to join the group of friends who have been watching over him for the last century. I can only imagine it was a rowdy homecoming with lots of music, dancing, and celebration. My friend and fellow assisted living [...]
OK, I know the premise is a little implausible but no more so than the Holy Trinity, Parinirvana or Plenary Indulgences. Besides, who wouldn't like to see Jesus and the Buddha, on mahogany bar stools, each with a cold one, discussing Yankee relievers, where to get a good Havana cigar, and how [...]
We call the bridge between birth and death "aging." In it's ascendancy, we are "young" even though our 10 trillion youthful cells have already started losing DNA telomere base pairs each time they divide. If we survive youth, our aging cells become senescent and start to die. We call this "growing old". We are [...]