Okay, here’s the plan. What we need to do first is ban abortions, all abortions. Not because we think it’s the right thing to do, but because it’s the only way we can get the religious right and the Tea Party off of this one issue and get them focused on the real needs of…

On the River with the Army of the Tennessee is an edited and annotated copy of the diary penned by my great-great grandfather, Dr William J. Rockwell as he tended the sick and wounded of 11th Indiana Regiment on board various boats as they steamed up the Tennessee River in 1862. He was a hospital…

She was right on time. You know how the really rich lead such different lives from us that they make our little worlds seem totally insignificant. Mrs. James Robertson did all of that to me and more just by her presence. It was more than her elevated station in life; it was her magnificent beauty…

I found the following letters tied with a faded old ribbon in the bottom drawer of an old friend’s dresser shortly after she passed away. She had saved these letters for … let’s see … they’re postmarked 1942 … that’s 68 years. These must be the last letters from her young husband; the husband she…

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for tradition. But some things just grow old and don’t work anymore no matter how hard we try to preserve them. I’ve spelled out a few of the things I think we need to address and update. Like stuff we’re teaching our children that we no longer believe in…

“I met her in a poker game. She was dealin’ for the house at the Bee Hive Saloon in the Flats at old Fort Griffin over in Texas. As I recall, a typical evening went kinda like this.” “I’ll see your five and raise you twenty,” uttered this smug Eastern dude with his snooty British…

“Ouch! That damn bush bit me.” I groaned to my son and hiking buddy, Rob, while I stopped to pull a thorn from my bleeding finger. Rob was a couple of yards ahead of me on a make-shift trail leading down into a sandy arroyo. Rob wandered back to me and laughed at my girlish…

“I’ll blow you for some beer.” Were the first words spoken by this ragtag, little waif standing in the supermarket parking lot on an exceptionally warm November afternoon in 1967. “Thanks for the offer but I think I’ll pass for now; maybe after we get to know each other a little better. What do you…

“Start Listening … Open WordPad … It’s hot comma my tee shirt is wringing wet comma my left arm throbs comma my pajama bottoms are wadded up in my crotch comma my mouth is painfully dry and I have to take a leak period,” I spoke into my new microphone. The text — It’s hot,…

The last set ended a little before eleven at my favorite club, Blues Alley in Georgetown. Anxious to un-stick my butt from their vinyl bar stool, I wondered out into the sweltering summer night intending to drive straight home, but for some reason I felt compelled to swing around the national mall on my way.…