Island Passage

Add this to the list of general cluelessness of Democratic leadership when dealing with matters of faith: Mike Branhom of the Associated Press reports that John Kerry is trying the new Democratic strategy of "speaking to people of faith" by trying to bash Republicans with the Bible: ORLANDO -- Former Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, who lost this crucial swing state in November, sounded Friday as if he were still stumping for Florida's votes. The Massachusetts senator, at a National Head Start Association conference to tout his plan to provide health care for uninsured children, hammered on familiar themes of values and unity while repeatedly criticizing the Bush administration and Republican leaders in Congress. "I went back and reread the whole New Testament the other day. Nowhere in the three-year ministry of Jesus Christ did I find a suggestion at all, ever, anywhere, in any way whatsover, that you ought to take the money from the poor, the opportun...

Memorial Day weekend was a four-day affair for the Islander household (I took Friday off) . But before you curse me for a lazy lout, listen up. We had houseguests. Now, we love these guests. These guests are more like family than guests. We got to spend hours talking late into the night with people we love and respect. And yet. As I drove into work this morning I came around the Island's last hill and saw the ferry loading line stretching back a half-mile. At least an hour's wait. At first I felt chagrin--I was late for work as it was. But then I realized I was alone in the car with the radio off. As I coasted to a stop, put on the parking break, and switched off the engine, I drank in the silence. Mrs. Islander and I have begun adapting to the life of a couple again. All the Islander children have grown and are raising their own families. Some evenings we sit and watch a favorite movie on DVD. Sometimes we just sit and read or watch the sunset over the Olympic Mountains. But ...

When you get old enough, you see many things that you never though that you would. Last Saturday Mrs. Islander and one of the Islander daughters (the non-blogger) were tested for black belt in the Japanese sword art of Kenjutsu . You must believe me when I tell you that this is a sign of the coming Apocalypse. I am 6'5" and weigh in at a Falstaffian 280 lbs. Mrs. Islander is a twig, a breath; yet after a couple of years of Aikido training she can drop me like bad sushi. Now I find that she can cut my head off and spit down my neck (if she has a ladder handy.) Last Saturday (after a week of nights of tossing and turning and waking her long-suffering husband) she stepped onto the mat and showed her stuff. She was the second person that day to test. The first person to test was "Chainsaw," a graceful and energetic young man. He moved through the katas and forms smoothly. As he stepped off the mat there was polite applause. The Mrs. Islander stepped onto the mat. In th...

There you are. James Lileks has had just about enough of Minnesota weather: I left Fargo for a reason, after all. But of course you’re running away from yourself when you do something like this, right? Well, no. Wherever you go, there you are. But at least in Arizona, you’re warmer, and CRIMINEY JUDAS I’m tired of being cold all the time. You oughtn't be cold in May. I walk outside to the gazebo – can’t sit down, the seats are wet – and I can see my breath. Which is nice, because it means I’m alive. But still. All I know is that I’m coming to the end of a line, somehow. All I know I don’t want to die in a place where you can’t wear shorts in July. It’s 54 degrees here right now, and 95 in Scottsdale. The forecast here: cloudy and 10 degrees below normal into June. The forecast in Arizona: sunny and hot into the 29th century. If I spent my days in an office I might be less peeved, but even so I’d be ground down by the drizzling weekends, the panic that a cold July brings, the sense...

I once heard Billy Joel interviewed and he said something re-occurs to me now and then. Mr. Joel said that sometimes, when he is alone, he sits down at the piano and delights in the fact that he gets to hear Billy Joel live, taking his requests. Though it can read as though it was arrogance, at the time that statement stuck me like a small boy's exuberant daydreams come true. Many of us (males) have stood alone in the backyard weilding a bat and ball, but in our mind's eye we were at home plate in the bottom of the seventh inning of the World Series, bases loaded, two outs. We were not alone, but in the center of a hurricane of cheers, catcalls and whoops. Sometimes, in the midst of the most mundane aspects of my life, I am struck that I am living a dream come true. I grew up in what was then a small town in (whisper it!) Southern California. Hot and dusty, what grew there grew because people intended it to grow. If a patch of ground wasn't gardened or paved, it was dust an...

So here I am, a person who makes a living putting words on a page, and my daughter shames me into starting a blog. No, she didn't say anything. She didn't roll her eyes or shrug her sholders. She started her own blog and has posted some good readable entries. So my choice was to just leave smart-alec remarks in her comments, or start writing myself. Guilt is a terrible thing...