Latest Columns

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Autumn is a time to share in the lessons of letting go

Heart-warming are the changing seasons of life. When I was a youngster, life was about winter, spring, summer and fall – and each season had its highlights, beginning with Santa Claus in the winter. As I grew older, I came to see winter, spring, summer...
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Never adrift, an elder sailor still navigating at 89

“Come for the sailing. Stay for the friendships.” If that sounds like the kind of invitation that might flourish on the Chesapeake Bay, it is. In fact, the “sailing and friendships” call-to-action is the moniker of Singles on Sailboats – known as SOS – a...
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Columbus Day celebrates “big idea” not just a person

Musical prodigy James Deacon once observed that “What you see depends not only on what you look at but also on where you look from.”   In plain English, that might be called “perspective” or “point of view” or “frame of reference”. I thought of this...
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Shared stories make lasting memories among the generations

Are you familiar with the Paw Patrol? Perhaps not, especially if you’re in your bonus years. In that case, I’ll bet you remember Disney’s Popeye the Sailor Man or Steamboat Willy.  And who could forget Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner from Looney Toons? ...
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Engaging the next generation requires learning their language

Many of a certain age will remember the film, Grumpy Old Men.  That was back in 1993 when two curmudgeonly neighbors, a cantankerous John Gustafson (Jack Lemmon) and a belligerent Max Goldman (Walter Matthau), were constantly at each other’s throat.  Despite the constant nagging and...
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Grudging compromises are part and parcel of our bonus years

Nearly 100 years ago, Russian-born American sociologist Pitirim Sorokin coined the term “social mobility” to describe how an individual’s social status might change (improve or decline) over his or her own life – or from one generation to the next.  It was Sorokin’s work that...