I Invite You to Subscribe
-
Recent Posts
Archives
Search on this Site
Categories
Blogroll
- 86,400 Seconds
- A Song Not Scored for Breathing (Cheryl/Hope)
- Actual Unretouched Photo
- Afroculinaria
- Brittle Road
- Chuck Sigars
- CMI Assn. Mgt. Blog
- Cutting Through the Crap
- Elle Jauffret
- HSV Area Restaurants
- Lizardek's Obiter Dictum
- Me and You and Ellie
- Neflix Genre Categories
- Out of the Lotus
- Perils of Caffeine in the Evening
- The New Dharma Bums
- The Singing Wench
- Unretouched Photo
- Words/Love
- writing as jo(e)
- Your Fireant
Author Archives: John Swinburn
Pale Lights in the Night
Very early in the morning, just after midnight, the dim night light in the bathroom provides just enough illumination for me to avoid bumping into bedroom furniture. An hour and a half later, the faint glow of the microwave’s clock does the same … Continue reading
Posted in Insomnia
Leave a comment
Race in America: 13th
Last night, I watched a documentary film, directed by Ava DuVernay and entitled 13th, named after the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Ostensibly, the Thirteenth Amendment outlawed and eliminated slavery. The film convincingly argues slavery was preserved and sustained through mass incarceration … Continue reading
Posted in Philosophy
Leave a comment
Flaws, Faults, and How We Define Them
If you’re looking for flaws, look inside yourself. Look at your own behaviors, behaviors for which you would condemn others were they to engage in them. If you judge other people for failing to meet standards and expectations you are incapable … Continue reading
Posted in Philosophy, Secular morality
Leave a comment
A Bit of Background
Whisper. Tell the story, but tell it at such low volume that the audience must strain to hear it. Tell it like the truth can’t bear loud noise. There, now you know the predicament I’m in. Truth dare not speak … Continue reading
Posted in Fiction, Writing
Leave a comment
Malaise
My waning interest in writing troubles me. Or, perhaps, it’s my willingness to invest my fingers in fiction that’s atrophied in recent weeks. I want not to write, but to have written. I think Dorothy Parker wrote something like that. I … Continue reading
Posted in Philosophy, Writing
1 Comment
Broken
Redemption is a fallacy, a wish without reality. Mistakes are not corrected, they’re simply patched and painted. Atonement comes through action, if it ever comes at all, penance is a token, a souvenir of all that’s wrong. Forgiveness is just … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry
Leave a comment
Without a Plan
I’m drinking coffee in a thunderstorm. Well, not really IN a thunderstorm; that is, I’m not getting soaked. But I hear it. Cracks of thunder punctuate the sound of rain pounding on the roof. I can only imagine what the wind and … Continue reading
Posted in Philosophy
2 Comments
Trapped in a Mine
Today, while looking through old notebooks, I came across a note I wrote six years ago. Late in the evening of October 12, 2010. The note, dated October 12, 2010 and marked with the time I wrote it 10:28 p.m. read, … Continue reading
Posted in Compassion, Emotion, Memories
2 Comments
A Critic is Lurking
Take responsibility for undertaking a task and it’s bound to happen: someone—who could have taken on the task but did not—will offer criticism about how the job was done. The criticism is not always blunt and forceful; sometimes, it’s hidden beneath faint … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Leave a comment
Open Mic Night
Last night, the inaugural HSV Open Mic Night took place. I think the audience, numbering about seventy, was happy with it. I am glad I had friends who agreed to perform: poetry, story-telling, reading short stories, and reading memoirs. And, I … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Leave a comment
Desire
Softer. Gentler. More fully engaged. Focused on positivity. Repelled by gratuitous negativity. Disciplined. Decisive. Inspired. Generous. Forgiving. Courageous. Thoughtful. Wishful.
Posted in Uncategorized
Leave a comment
Decrepit and Decaying
Evidence of advancing age and inadequate exercise showed their ugly faces yesterday as I tried to prep for today’s planned paint festival. The urgency of overcoming my procrastination in getting the work done became apparent as I looked at the calendar, realizing … Continue reading
Posted in Aging
Leave a comment
Beneath the Daylight Streets
When I lived in Chicago, the fact that Michigan Avenue and Wacker Drive—both main streets in the thriving downtown/loop area—had multiple levels fascinated me. The pedestrian stairway entrances descending to those streets were my introductions to multi-level streets in the … Continue reading
Posted in Memories, Urban planning, Writing
Leave a comment
Social Evenings Can Change Dull to Dynamic
This evening, my wife and I attended the second Wines of the World dinner organized by the manager of the Coronado Center, a venue operated by our property owners association. The first event, focusing on the food and wine of … Continue reading
Posted in Beer, Happiness, Humor, Wine
Leave a comment
Kilns and Flights and Preference for Empty Space
Yesterday, I went to the sculpture studio early and spent a short while working on a bust that’s in the same visual style as many of my masks; odd and alien. For many reasons, not the least of which was … Continue reading
Posted in Art, Travel
Leave a comment
Bat Boy
Last night, toward the end of the PBS Newshour, I watched a segment about the retirement of long time Dodgers’ play-by-play announcer, Vin Scully. The segment honored the eighty-eight-year-old man’s sixty-eight year career. Despite my lifelong disinterest in sports, the … Continue reading
Posted in Emotion, Philosophy
Leave a comment
Whole Cloth
If we were honest with ourselves, we would admit that our lives are fictions, narrative yarns we spin from experiences as we see them, not necessarily as they are. We write the stories of our lives on the fly, stitching together the … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Leave a comment
Driving in the Dark
It’s ten minutes shy of four in the morning and I’m scrambling to prepare to drive to the airport. Mi esposa hermosa is off, in just a while, to visit her childhood friends for a two-day gathering in Charleston, South … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Leave a comment
Today is Genuflectorious
I ask the question: is there a law that compels us to label what is commonly the first workday of the week ‘Monday?’ Are we required to call the second day ‘Tuesday?’ And must weekends always fall on ‘Saturday’ and ‘Sunday?’ … Continue reading
Posted in Absurdist Fantasy
Leave a comment
On the Verge
Yesterday, a Facebook friend posted an appreciative comment on another person’s post. The post was a young man’s progress report on his effort to “reboot” himself. He had made the promise to himself a year earlier to reinvent himself through … Continue reading
Posted in Resolutions
Leave a comment
Caffeine and Convenience
Do pieces of electronics equipment undergo sympathetic experiences? For instance, does a coffee maker get sick when a smart phone dies? I ask this as part of a serious inquiry into the behavior of my coffee maker this morning. When … Continue reading
Posted in Philosophy
Leave a comment
Dullard
Technology is a powerful tool that, if one is not careful, can deliver an emotional roller-coaster. The capabilities delivered through technology can, if one lets them, dig holes in one’s psyche. I have a specific example in mind. The platform … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
6 Comments
Stars
Last night, as I sat on the deck looking upward, I counted a billion stars. I may have missed one or two, but I think that’s forgivable, considering the scope of the sky. Cool, clear nights are the best ones … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Leave a comment
Another Day to Remember
Just like every year on this day, my mother’s birthday, I pause to reflect about her. She was a good woman, a good mother, and a good teacher. I owe my love of language and food to her. And, of course, … Continue reading
Posted in Family
Leave a comment
Moral Equivalence
Last night, I posted the following statement on Facebook: People who claim they will not vote because the choices do not suit them are cowards. Their moral high ground is freakish bullshit. They have no compassion; they have an inability … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Leave a comment