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It seems a part of getting together with old friends that inevitably the conversation stays to “remember when?” and the “good-ole days.”

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I have never claimed to be a nice person. It wasn’t in my upbringing. My father was a mean drunk who not only didn’t have time for a family, he wanted a different one He was a notorious womanizer who claimed I was an accident; and a lazy shit who was unworthy of wasting his hard-earned money.

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I endured another holiday of family gatherings with my normal lack of gusto. Visiting my mother who has given up on life, and refuses to get out of bed was depressing enough. The rest of Christmas day was spent with my son and in-laws.

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VThis isn’t a commentary on the Presidential election. I’m sure we’ve all had enough of those. This is more a commentary on how people, particularly leaders, need to act responsibly. Last week a Detroit Pastor made a statement which was so irresponsible, so inflammatory, I thought he should be arrested.

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Like most kids, I tried to answer the question of what I wanted to be when I grew up.

For me, the answer came in the mid-1960s during a Detroit Lions vs. Green Bay Packers game while preparing for Thanksgiving dinner. I recall sharing the couch with my grandparents in the family room of our rented ranch while sitting before our tiny, Panasonic black-and-white TV. Both my parents were drunk. My mother was hovering between the family room and the kitchen while trying to watch dinner and the game. The smell of dinner was overpowering.
“Oh, I just love Alex Kraus,” my mother wooed and ogled at the Lion’s defensive tackle during one pass through the room. “He’s so big and strong.”

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One of the problems I imagine many writers face is learning how to write with distractions. I’m not talking about environmental distractions like noisy kids, although those can be a pain in the ass, too. I’m thinking more about life’s distractions, I’m thinking about the kind of distractions which ruin your concentration and imagination… the kind that ruin your day of writing if you can’t clear them from your mind.

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What would you do to save someone you love from injury? What if that someone was your dog?
I have shared the half-century of my life with nine very loving and loyal dogs. Skye, our five-year-old Siberian husky, is my tenth. I have treated all our dogs as if they were one of my children. My son thinks they are treated better than him. I know Skye eats better than he does now that he lives on his own.

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One of the responses I get when people learn I write full time for a living, is, “Oh that must be an exciting life.”

I’m never sure how to answer this, because I believe one’s level of excitement is relative to their experience in life, and I think many people equate the life of a writer with that of the rich and famous, which is untrue. At least it’s untrue of my life, at this point.

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