The BoomerGuy Chronicles

The 2024 ELECTION threw me for a loop; I have reflected and read and listened and analyzed over and over and have been slow to  accept that the House, Senate , and Presidency were won by the MAGA Republicans. My home state of Michigan elected a Democrat, Elissa Slotkin, to an open Senate seat, but the presidential vote went to Donald Trump. These results mystified and immobilized me for months. Only recently have I begun to crawl out of my deep dark depression and begin to engage in thinking and doing any type of active civic engagement. I figured that opportunities would present themselves along the way.  Last  month, Cathe and I drove to Washington D.C. ,  camped in the Beltway National Campground near College Park, Maryland and participated in "Moral Monday"sponsored by "Repairers of the Breach", led by Rev. William Barber. A diverse group of people from all over America  advocated against the so called "Big Beautiful Bill" which will devastate health c...

On Election Day in November  we  volunteered as "Poll Chaplains"   in Flint at the Freeman School Polling Place  for an Interfaith organization called Faiths United to Save Democracy.  Our task was to ensure that people who wanted to vote could do so without interference... to mediate any disputes and to help ensure a free and fair election. We met fine people we agreed with and disagreed with politically; one Republican volunteer told us he didn't like his candidate's views on immigration, a Democratic youth volunteer was pushing environmental justice, a local Baptist pastor came to support our mediation work. We spent a day "on the ground" outside of the Ann Arbor bubble. It was inspiring and hopeful. The result of the November Election shocked me.  I had believed  that the "better angels" of the U.S. society (As defined by Lincoln is his first Inaugural Address) would prevail to create unity, hope, service and equality so that our nation could ...

  Each one of us is called to reflection, prayer, preparation and action in these challenging times. Advent this year has been meaningful as we brought out  candles and the Dickens Village, decorated a Christmas Tree and posted a wreath and lights outside. We've read  scripture  stories of hope and anticipation and peace and love .  The story  of Mary's visit and Elizabeth's baby "leaping for joy" was especially inspiring to me this year. Whatever one's faith tradition, the natural world's slowing down and darkening toward the Winter Solstice brings feelings of loneliness as well as connection. I've reminisced on  Christmas Seasons past of Joy as well as Sadness.... family meals and parties, pepper nuts and cookies, baked hash brown potatoes and Christmas ham or turkey, hot chocolate and popcorn, football games and "snow bowls", singing carols with family, card games and charades, electric trains and stuffies, Midnight Mass and Santa Lucia,  ...

Last winter,  my younger sister Mary Ellen invited me to join her on a May '24  bike trip along the Mississippi Great River Road. Considering that  at the age of Seventy -Five was daunting to me. The last time I had attempted a multi-day ride was our "Tour De Thumb" five years ago. Prior to that , I had ridden 250+ miles on  the DalMac in 2011 from Lansing to Mackinac City. Several questions roiled around my brain ....   Could I ride a bicycle 300+ miles? Would I have the stamina to make it? What preparations were needed? Was this just a crazy notion? Am I in denial about the limitations faced by this old baby boomer? May 10, 2024 found Cathe and me camping in Muscatine Iowa awaiting the arrival of my sister , Mary Ellen during the middle of her "Holy Ride" from St. Paul , Minnesota to St. Louis Missouri. We celebrated with wine and chili around the campfire with her lifelong friend Mary Lou from Oakland,  our sister Kathy and our part-time Sag Driver, Cath...

                                                 Atomic Bomb Blast, Nagasaki Japan, August 1945 St. Patrick's Day arrives,  the crocuses peek out after a Michigan snowstorm on the first day of Spring and a song from my formative years keeps running through my brain:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztZI2aLQ9Sw This song won a Grammy nomination for Edwin Starr in 1971......A  Motown hit, not a folk/ rock protest song by Bob Dylan or  Joan  Baez. Quick  research discovers that this song was censored off Clear Channel radio stations after 9-11-2001. Fast forward to  2024. Ukraine destruction following Russian invasion Terrorists in Moscow Migrants fleeing violence in Central America. 30,000 plus Palestinians killed in Gaza, mostly children. A congressman's brother killed by his son in Flint after a violent confrontation. The Academ...

Late Fall and the onset of Winter in Michigan can be downright dreary.  Bright snow falling back in the day used to blanket the ugly bare ground, but climate change has squashed that. Damp, cold, dark days pile up. Nature has her ways of  slowing down, gathering warmth, sheltering from  the storm;  a wayward bat found it's way into our laundry room  to find refuge from the elements as the cold weather  advanced in November. On Thanksgiving, I turned seventy-five and the Lions lost to the Packers at Ford Field.  Turning seventy-five was more of a milestone than I expected.  It's a big number!   My family coordinated the assembly of a reflection/memories book of photos and writing which touched me deeply.  This birthday set me upon a course of reflection amid the Winter doldrums that persisted throughout the Christmas Season and into the  New Year. At the end of January, I traveled South to reflect, to explore, to socialize, to w...