To pay it forward means that instead of paying someone back for a good deed, you do a good deed for someone else. Maybe you’ll surrender your first-place position in a long line at the 7-Eleven when someone behind you is in a hurry. On a rainy day, you might hand an umbrella to someone […]
Ten Reasons to Pay It Forward Read More »
Montezuma Well is an ecosystem unlike any other. It’s a collapsed limestone sinkhole located in the juniper-mesquite shrublands of Verde Valley, Arizona. It holds a 55-foot-deep body of water rich in CO2 and thin in oxygen. The heavy ambient air makes a trek through the area feel like a tranquil dream. This sensation alone is a worthwhile experience. Two hot
Andrei Tarkovsky once said, “It is a mistake to talk about the artist looking for his subject. In fact, the subject grows within him like a fruit and begins to demand expression. It is like childbirth.” This means that art springs from somewhere other than the controlling elements of the conscious, rational mind. In such a
Tarkovsky and Stalker: In the Zone Read More »
Sean was fed up with his job as an assistant manager at the local Dinostop service station. He stared through the window at the big purple dinosaur statue in the yard next to the gas pumps. His boss was skimming money from the safe every morning and doctoring the paperwork to make it look like
The Dream of the Gray Whale Read More »
A squadron of Canadian geese lifted off from the half-frozen lake, curved in a smooth semi-circle, and powered over my head in a perfect V. Solitary fishermen stood along the shoreline at distant intervals, like quarter-mile markers measuring the bike path I travelled. A man in a down coat sat at a picnic table, his
A Winter Bike Ride Read More »
The man across the table glared at Howard Collins and said, “Hey, I pay your salary, dude. You have no right to hold out on me. You know damn well I’m allergic to Tramadol. I need Percocet. I’m in pain! Can’t you see that?” Howard considered the irony. He had spent several years and $140,000
For every single mother working three jobs. . . . Read More »