When I was about 10 and my brother was 8, we were fascinated by my Dad’s wooden shoe shine kit.  We liked everything about it, the paste, the brushes, the saddle soap, the special polishing rags, the compartments and the place on top where a person could rest their shoe as it was being worked on.  One Saturday, after dinner, we asked my dad if we could polish his shoes before he and my mom went out.  He said, Okay, so we set about doing it the way we had seen him do it many times before.  He was very impressed and gave each of us a quarter (a small...

I learned a long time ago that when people are upset, they often need to express themselves before they can get over what is bothering them.  I saw this in my children and the children of my friends and I knew it was true from my own childhood.  When I was hurt, I needed to tell somebody and let those feelings out.  If I didn’t, it was hard for me to feel normal and happy again. Even now, when our grown daughter is upset, she calls her mom and lets her know what is bothering her.  I see this as a good thing and I watch how quickly she recovers from...

I’ve noticed that whenever something awful or wonderful happens in the news, there is an attempt by the media to find out the cause, the things in a person’s life that led up to the incident in question.  Interestingly, it is never hard to find something in a person’s past that explains or accounts for their adult behavior.  That’s one of the problems with looking back; history always seems like a linear progression i.e., this led to this which led to that which led to…the criminal act (or the heroic act). It’s probably not that simple.  One...