John Marlowe

Close your eyes. Wait a minute! What am I thinking? That won’t work. How are you going to read the rest of this experiment if your eyes are closed? Let’s start again. Make-believe that your eyes are closed. That’s better! And it is a perfectly acceptable preamble to what’s coming next. Because from this point…

I’ve been dog-sitting. My brother and his family are on their way to Michigan for a well-deserved vacation. When you own two dogs, have twin 2-year-olds, and a loving wife for whom your term of endearment is “Commander,” Michigan may not be far enough. (As a quick aside, I’m praying that my sister-in-law has forgotten…

Brian called the other day. My friend wanted to let me know that, after two years of retirement, he was going back into the workforce. It didn’t surprise me completely, because I was just as shocked two years ago when Brian decided to retire early. At 57, I thought he had several more years of…

I know that I tend to be hard on myself. Too hard, really. But honestly, there are times when I feel like on the road of life, I can’t find my way out of the rest park. There was a time when I thought I had it all figured out. Just do nice things for…

In the famous “temple scene” in George Lucas’ story Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), Harrison Ford, as our hero Indiana Jones, makes his way to steal the golden idol. He first must navigate a series of booby-trapped plates in the floor, dodge poison darts and negotiate the tripwires leading up the steps.…

The child’s frenzied shriek pierced the summer afternoon dullness. It supercharged the epinephrine in my bloodstream until my legs involuntarily sprang from the kneehole of my desk, and sent me hurtling toward the children’s play area behind the house next door. The incessant shrill, now coming from more than one child, brought me to despair.…

It happens about this time every year. Despite meaning well and good intentions, I’ve again become the neighborhood pariah. Situated smack dab between the two-story modern with the terraced wall and the wrap-around deck to my west, and the venerable ranch on the east, with the two stately oaks in front and the neatly trimmed…