The Long Goodbye

I started working for Medtronic on September 27th, 1999. I was jumping from one orthopedic company to another. In the town I grew up in, if you didn’t go to college you either worked at Dalton Foundry, R.R. Donnelley & Sons(major printing company for years), or you lucked out and got in with one of […]

Chuck

Next week will be my uncle Chuck’s 80th birthday. He’s the oldest, with my dad being five years behind him at 75. To be perfectly honest I don’t know my uncle Chuck all that well. In fact, I’m not even sure I’ve ever had a full conversation with the man. He was never around when […]

Labor Of Love

The true meaning of Labor Day weekend has nothing to do with not laboring because you do that crap all week long. No, laboring doing something you love is perfectly fine. Why? Because I say so, that’s why. For me, I started a Labor Day weekend tradition many Labor Days ago. Maybe in 2014 or […]

Projecting On The Dog, Kids Leaving, Getting Older….

I came home from work today to a small spot of spit up on the carpet in front of the door that goes out to the garage. My nearly 11-year old miniature schnauzer has a tendency to lick his hair when he’s nervous/bored/etc… and that makes him spit up occasionally. He also got into something […]

Ritual

There’s certain rituals that I just cannot let go of. My brain is wired a certain way, and to deviate from these things in my life would cause complete mental havoc. Civilizations woudl crumble, lives would be forever changed, planets would tumble infinitely through space till they turned to space dust, and I’d be in […]

The Big Quiet

We’re just three weeks from the start of school. Our youngest will be starting his junior year of high school, driving himself every morning in the same mini-van that used to take him to grade school. Our middle child is 18 and she’ll be starting her freshman year of college at Ferris State University. Go […]

Cleveland Rock City

My grandpa Hubner died in November of 1986, just a month before my 13th birthday. He was 75. E.A. Hubner was a pretty great grandpa, despite not really seeing him a whole lot. Elwood and Dorothy Jean(grandma Hubner) would come over occasionally on sunny Sundays to visit and drop off dime store fireworks or those […]

Weird Dream; Made Up Memories

I had the strangest dream. In this dream I was at my parents house. There were other relatives there. My uncle Mark was there helping to move dirt and boards that were covering a hole in the backyard. In the dream I called my uncle Matt instead of Mark, and this seemed to make him […]

My 21st Father’s Day

I called my dad this past Sunday morning to wish him a happy Father’s Day. In the conversation, after he wished me the same I told him that my oldest bought the ingredients to make me an Old Fashioned as an early Father’s Day gift. He laughed and said “You know you’re getting old when […]

Pomp and Circumstance

I remember it like it just happened. I was at work and I got a call from my wife. She asked me to listen to our 3-year old daughter breathing, as my wife said she sounded a little labored. She put the phone down to her and I could hear the steady, quick wheeze and […]