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Ghost of His Father
“It’s quite simple. He proves by algebra that Hamlet’s grandson is Shakespeare’s grandfather and that he is himself the ghost of his own father.” —James Joyce, Ulysses Dad had all the answers. All I...
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Ghost! Busted!
Of course it had to happen early in the morning. My routine: Up at 7 a.m., coffee on, bathroom. But while switching on the home office lights, I happened to glance at the dining room table. “Hmm....
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They’ve Only Just Begun (Addendum)
I’m not particularly superstitious, so I’ll just throw this out to y’all. You decide what to make of it, especially coming off a blog post from about a month ago. This morning I sorted and recycled...
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Happy Campers III (Part 2)
[Last of a two-part post] “The laziest of days and I love it,” begins the Aug. 3, 1978, diary entry. “…I’ve been wandering around, watching volleyball games, playing piano, talking and listening to...
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New Kid in Town
“The Day arrived and was over too fast.” Saturday, Sept. 23, 1978: The big first date with Jocey. So many blurred memories, so many assumptions. But a detailed diary entry now holds a mirror up to it....
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Hector
I wasn’t exactly one of them, but I totally understood thumbsuckers. Fairly sure I haven’t made this confession here before, but I used to suck my curled left forefinger long after it was appropriate...
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Jon Anderson’s Fashion Tips for Young Men
My late father was a sharp dresser, especially when he was younger. In retirement he sort of let it all go—something he claimed the semi-tropical Florida climate did to him. When baby brother and I...
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Legacy
So, here I am. Eldest son of two people who died in 2008—Mom in the spring, Dad in the fall. And while I realize I’m not the only person in the world to ever have dearly loved people die on them,...
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Leaving the Lake
“The past is a story I tell to forget about the present.” Yeah, yeah, I know. I wrote that the past is nothing I’m particularly fond of. That the beating heart of this blog lies in the questions that...
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Junior’s Farm
In the summer or early autumn of 1980, my late father, Paul J. Maupin, became what my second cousin Karla laughingly called, “a gentleman farmer.” The house at 2821 Casco Point Road was sold, and a...
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Facing Goliath
“I cannot go in these,” David said to Saul, “Because I am not used to them.” —1 Samuel 17 Sunday, 5:00 p.m., Nov. 9, 2008: My girlfriend at the time, AJ, and I attended worship service at House of...
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When Talk Was Cheap
So, I took this class at Lakewood. Must’ve been fall of 1980, since I can’t find it in the transcripts for fall-winter quarters of 1979–80. “Interpersonal Communication. 10 a.m.” We had to keep a...
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Curly Toes
Dear Mom and Dad: How are you enjoying disembodiment? Good, I hope. I often think about all your former aches and pains, especially as I’m growing older, too. No longer having a physical body must be a...
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Housekeeping
It seems spindly now. So small, fragile. After The Family Project packed into our blue Chevy II station wagon and headed to Maryland, it was likely purchased there. Made of cherry wood, the dining room...
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Ghost! Busted!
Of course it had to happen early in the morning. My routine: Up at 7 a.m., coffee on, bathroom. But while switching on the home office lights, I happened to glance at the dining room table. “Hmm....
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They’ve Only Just Begun (Addendum)
I’m not particularly superstitious, so I’ll just throw this out to y’all. You decide what to make of it, especially coming off a blog post from about a month ago. This morning I sorted and recycled...
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The Lock-In
“Venus was out roller skating.” Mars had expectations, but Venus dashed those to pieces. She washed her long blonde hair with strawberry crème rinse, wriggled into her tightest Jordache jeans, smacked...
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Ladder (Part 2)
[Last of a two-part post.] “You, Michael,” my late father once said to me, “are a pack rat. It doesn’t take you long to make your nest.” Whether that quote is verbatim, I don’t know. But he said...
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Atonement
I got curious. Not like “curious strange” (although you might think so), but curious like “I’m wondering about…” Always a positive sign of my mental health. As I was wandering around the locker room...
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Approaching the Frontier
“The man with imagination but no knowledge is like a bird with wings but no feet.” There it was—a collection of quotes stuck in my bed frame, written in the early 1970s when I was preteen. I found them...
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