Everyone wants a little piece of the pie, and everyone wants to have their 5 minutes of fame … We live in a country that was founded on very basic principles. There would be no royalty, no feuds. A duly elected government where all would be equally represented. Everyone would have the same possibilities and each individual would have the opportunity to pursue those very possibilities, according to his/her capabilities. That was some two hundred years ago. The world has changed since then. It has become much more complicated, faster, smaller in a way. We now know what happens on the other side as it actually happens. Whether we want to, or not. We as a nation have grown, mostly along with the rest of the world. Scores of nations have come and gone -and some come again- in that time, but we persevere. We are here. A little bigger around the waist and perhaps with less hair than years ago when it was customary to wear a wig, so we could emulate those very folks “over there” w...

Sometimes writing is difficult. Like now...  Like when pure laziness has kept me from sitting here, in front of the one-eyed-monster and actually thinking about something, anything at all, which can be written into this God-awful blank page into which my eyes stare… hoping for an apparition to come and say the “writing muse” is OK… that it has just been resting, tucked away in a corner of my mind. That lost corner where all things ignored go and hide, hoping not to be called back into service any time soon. Then, the fishing begins. A look at FB to read about friends and family, where they are and what they are doing this early in the year… some are dining, some are traveling… some put pictures of family and accomplishments and some are reliving past times and reviewing what was, or what may have been had it not been for life itself and the way in which “she” ( must be a she… no? ) chooses to hand out little triumphs when she well knows, with her unerring foretelling visio...

2014 is nearing the end; perhaps before its time, perhaps too late in coming but… ready or not, the New Year is ready to roar to life… A review of the year’s happenings is a “de-rigueur” thing to do about this time. Every radio or TV program has its own mini history reduced into a few thousand pixels or sound bites of what went on during the year. On a TV show I saw recently for a few minutes, there was a review –with graphic pictures- about the deaths of several renowned actors and singers. Seems people can’t get enough of their idols, live or dead… As citizens of a country which has grown to accept violence as a somewhat normal day-to-day issue, Mexicans have adjusted to living in this uncertainty… but even they were shocked into action by a mass murder which took the lives of 43 young students for expressing themselves against abuses of the local political czar. Not too far south, Venezuela has become the second most dangerous country in the world, under the totally...

Much like the emperor of fabled fame, President Obama was left with no clothes on and saying thanks for the memories…   Yesterday was another day in a week which promised to be just another week, filled with regular, routine days. Yet, we were given some news which broke this uneventful moment; news which, in a different context and parameters, would have been welcome. As the President spoke from the podium, we were informed that there had been an agreement to exchange prisoners and to re-establish relations with Cuba, after 50+ years of diplomatic void. There would be new business avenues open, and even the status of Cuba as a terrorist sponsor nation would be subject to revision. All this, in exchange for basically… nothing. What happened was that with one unilateral (and probably unconstitutional) decision, Obama has given a new lease on life to a tired, sagging regimen that has oppressed 11M citizens, caused massive people flight and has germinated untold deaths thr...

Fall Is Coming. It has always been my favorite season of the year. That is, since the first time I experienced seasonal changes as a teen, after coming to this country. This affinity, however, is now taking on a different meaning for me. I cannot help but understand and accept that as time passes on, my life is a very much like a one year calendar which is becoming a little faded but yet comfortable to hold and to read, and that the approach of the fall season is very much like the approach, in my own life, of that period when an invisible barrier is passed and one accepts the fact that a good part of an existence has passed on, much like those pages on that calendar. Not morbidity, just reality. Those older sheets in that calendar are choke full of notes and anecdotes; of happy notations and very sad marks… sometimes just a dark exclamation point on specific dates that mark painful moments; moments which leave a memory forever. Some of those pages are relatively blank. I...

In the beginning, birthdays were the stuff of presents, cakes, friends… as I explore the second half of my life, they become reminders of a sort. Very soon I will be reaching my 68 th birthday; almost at the seventh decade portal. I sit here today, alone, staring at this typewriter, and my mind ( yes Virginia, there is a mind inside there, somewhere …) wonders about, unfettered and unhinged from any and all the pertinent pressures of daily living. Not a small accomplishment, mind you. Maria Jose So, I thought I would give myself a gift and return to these blog pages, an area of my liking which I have left unattended for a long time. I stare at Maria José, who is my daily companion, a beautiful plant which sits there giving me her company ( yes, “her” ) without uttering any complaints or endearments, for that matter. I hope she gives me a clue about what to write… but, like a good psychiatrist, just listens, stares and says nothing… I look at two of my father’s...

…a mini fairy tale… or not? Once upon a time, not too long ago, there were two brothers who roamed the plains, searching for great deeds to accomplish ( apparently not much else to do for these folks ) as well as some fame and, above all, a little fortune. Maybe even a Holy Grail thrown in for good measure. This would be considered the BIG prize… and they were both willing to do anything to get it, even if it meant doing in brother number two ( always the other one is number two )… In their case, this big prize was a job. Understand this was not a common job… no sir!! This was a job which gave prestige, fame, position and –above all- power… power to control all those who lived on the plains… The embodiment of all those rare levels that very few could even dream of achieving. So… how would you go about getting this plum of a job? I’m sure you are by now asking yourself… As it turns out and, very surprisingly, there are no real black and white qualifications needed… the impo...