I sit on the plane, alive and aware, as the Parkinson’s courses through its cycles of mistrust, ceding disdain’s focused calm to the shadow game that surrounds. No longer able to reliably drive, I took the three-hour shuttle to SeaTac…
Enduring intentions
We are born free and bred into insecurity, bequeathed from ancestors an innate fear of being revealed as the scared little children we are, searching for our place in the world. We have learned instead to march to an unfamiliar…
Contrived distortion
During a recent hike, I noticed a seal swimming near shore in the swift Deception Pass current. The seal appeared to be paralleling my course, swimming effortlessly into the current but only making marginal headway before transitioning to his version…
My nemesis, the woodpecker
Yesterday, my wife and I drove to Seattle for a scheduled neurology appointment. I find myself miss-identifying common sounds and unable to discern their origin. Other times, I’m surprised by an unfamiliar noise coming either from my imagination or beyond.…
Life’s details
Sunday, while driving through town on my way to the grocery store, I encountered one of those indulgently sincere, shared moments created by connecting souls with candid meaning. I stopped as a middle-aged lady with impaired mobility wheeled her chair…
Reflections
I usually prefer to walk or hike alone to have an undistracted opportunity to think until thought is no longer helpful. These periods of meditative-silenced cognition bring my most peaceful moments, absent the standard lunatic ravings that bounce around my…
Tyrannical anxiety
Over Christmas, my wife and I visited family in San Francisco, staying at the same beachfront hotel we had on a previous trip south eight years prior. The season, age, and my Parkinson’s progression separated the two hotel stays, factors…
Final Odyssey
It’s been over ten years since last venturing out during New Year’s Eve, what I used to consider amateur night. That’s what a lifetime of hard drinking will do to you—soften criticism of those who managed to interject a modicum…
Clever grace
When I was nine, the family hit the road after work one Friday, searching for a place to park our VW to enjoy the outdoors. Almost all coastal Greece is beautiful, making finding a campsite in 1971 easy. After helping…
Coexisting realities
The deep brain stimulator surgically implanted in 2014 has served me well, but its effectiveness wanes each day. A persistent brain fog hounds me, often leaving imagination as my only reliable companion in adventures of memory. Today, I traveled back…