Author Archives: John Swinburn

We are sitting in the main building of M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, passing time until my requested arrival time of 11:30. The Texas Medical Center is enormous…many, many buildings representing medical specialties from the most common to the rarest of … Continue reading →

The blank page stares at me again this morning, like yesterday, but I have no mocking, sarcastic comments at the ready to make light of the situation. Instead, I gaze helplessly at the screen, hoping the gears of my mind … Continue reading →

Searching for something to think can be an exercise in extreme frustration. No matter where one looks—even in hidden creases and beyond promising bends in the psyche—only emptiness can be found. Emptiness saturates the past, present, and future, as if … Continue reading →

The points at which people are willing to risk imprisonment, torture, or their lives in the fight for freedom and self-determination vary. Most people whose lives have not been badly upended by the cruelty of a dictatorial regime probably have … Continue reading →

Not long ago, as I neared a small but tangled highway intersection on the edge of Hot Springs, Arkansas, I was struck by the similarities between humans and ants. Not their physical appearance, of course, but the deliberate nature of … Continue reading →

Had time not plunged forward in the wee hours of this morning, the moment I am experiencing right now would have been labeled 4:21 A.M. However, thanks to what seems to me a rather arbitrary shift, clocks added an hour. … Continue reading →

Sixty years ago today, the first 3500 combat troops arrived in Vietnam to defend the U.S. air base at Da Nang. I do not know whether any of those troops were among the 58,220 U.S. military fatal casualties of the … Continue reading →

Early yesterday morning, I received a phone call from M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, following up on a referral from my oncologist. A consequence of the conversation is that I am scheduled to meet in Houston with an M.D. Anderson oncologist … Continue reading →

The results from my PET-scan were available to me on the cancer center’s portal within an hour or two of the procedure yesterday (Wednesday) morning. As usual, the findings in the report were laced with medical terminology and, therefore, not … Continue reading →

Online news this morning is deeply depressing, so I will not subject myself to any more of it for a while. I made the mistake of glancing at the AP and NPR websites when I sat down; the headlines were … Continue reading →

A quick scan of today’s Life Kit feature on the NPR website this morning led me to another NPR story from last September.  The second piece changed my approach to this drab-looking day just enough to make me want to … Continue reading →

Yesterday afternoon, after the outside temperatures had climbed into the low 50s, I went for a short walk. Walking into the brisk breeze, in the dappled shadows of leafless trees, I felt uncomfortably cool, despite wearing a down vest. When … Continue reading →

Immutable facts—certainty cast in bronze—often take on different appearances when viewed through a temporal lens. Like people, as they age, they can become encrusted with patina left by the passage of time. Though facts may remain unchanged, their importance—or their … Continue reading →

I finally solved the most recent problem with my blog’s administrative interface, at least for the moment. There’s much more to learn about how to avoid such problems in the future and what to do to limit the potential for … Continue reading →

Blog admin still not functioning properly, but I have nothing better to do…just waiting for the next chemo session and PET-scan. ========= I frequently think about—and perhaps mention too often in my writing—the significance of context in how we perceive the world … Continue reading →

Still no fix…but here is what I have been unable to easily post thus far… February 27, 2025 Exploring one’s creativity can be immensely rewarding, but unless it is accompanied by the ability to adequately express it physically—through writing, sculpture, … Continue reading →

My blog admin is broken. I hope to have it repaired soon. In the interim, I will not blog…but I will continue to write…just not here.

We experience the stages of our existence at the mercy of a mercurial universe, one that vacillates between unexpected kindness and capricious cruelty. Ascribing human attributes to the cosmos seems absurd—and it is, as I begin to understand that my … Continue reading →

We now can describe the symptoms of COVID-19 from first-hand experience. In our case they are quite similar to the symptoms of a severe cold—chest congestion, sore throat, coughing, headache, chills, body aches, nasal congestion, and general malaise, among others. … Continue reading →

Yesterday, my cold made me feel miserable all day and all night. If not for the rough, raw, sandpaper-like scratching inside my throat, the day might have been a tad more tolerable; even then, though, I would have had to … Continue reading →

It was worth a shot, I thought. I decided to give it a try; open a website operated by a Canadian media company, in an attempt to avoid the constant barrage of desperately-negative news from U.S. media companies. Almost immediately, … Continue reading →

There was a time not so very long ago that I thought of “preppers” as “nut-case conspiracy theorists” with irrational action plans. I still think some preppers are just that. But I am developing a growing regard for people who … Continue reading →

Harmony. Yin Yang. Peace. On occasion, I superficially explore various elements of Buddhism. My intent, in examining concepts and practices of Buddhism, is to develop an understanding of a philosophical framework that seems—on first blush—to be the very core of simplicity. … Continue reading →

Shadows are obstacles created by light. When light is extinguished, its companion shadows die with it. In the absence of light and shadows, darkness fills space with empty obscurity. Empty obscurity asserts it strength by simply existing; a dark, vacant … Continue reading →

Glancing around my desk, hoping for inspiration, my mind remains vacant. Nothing provokes thought. Ideas flash through my brain, gone before they have time to settle and take shape. I try to force myself to focus on something…anything…that will trigger … Continue reading →