Free-Floating Stories+

Welts, lumps and discolorations mysteriously appear on my body lately, and I don’t remember how they got there. For example, putting on my sock, the other day, I noticed a bruise on my shin. My daughter, Mia, helped me pinpoint its origin. Seems her toddler, Zo (aka Lorenzo), had just come out with a four-letter … Continue reading All Ears for Expletives

In the movie Rainman , Raymond Babbitt, an autistic savant, keeps obsessively repeating the Abbott and Costello "Who's on first" routine. In his disturbed mental state, he doesn't see the humor in the words. He uses the classic schtick as a kind of ritual to provide security in times of stress. His brother Charley tries … Continue reading Good Humor Is No Joke

So, here’s me jogging in the park by my house. I’m feeling good. I check out my shadow in the morning sun. Looking good too. Standing tall, arms pumping. Then a guy passes me. Walking. Well, not just strolling, kind of speed walking. Ha! I shout at the guy, “Hey buddy! Slow down, you’re messing … Continue reading Preserving Self-Image

The phone rings at the rectory. Fr. Cuomo: Good afternoon. St. Peter’s. Mrs. Cuomo: Franky, how you doing? Fr. Cuomo: Ma, when you call me Franky I know you want something. Mrs. Cuomo: What? You want me to call my son the Reverend Father Francis Cuomo? Fr. Cuomo: What’s up? Mrs. Cuomo: My cousin Tony… … Continue reading I No Killa Nobody

I’ve seen her walk by my beach lately. Probably a neighbor. Not many Lake Michigan regulars after Labor Day. She looks like Barbie would look, thirty-five years later, with a little extra ballast to counterweight her formidable bowsprit. I don’t know if you believe me or not, but I’m not a dirty old man. I … Continue reading Barbie+

Supporting a child's dreams? I’m chilled. The rink is never warm. Even though I bundle up with thermals and fleece and down jackets, I’m always cold just sitting here in the penetrating cold. But Carly in her tights and workout dress looks perfectly comfortable. Why shouldn’t she? She’s been doing warm ups for twenty minutes … Continue reading The Trailing Parent

I took a ‘roots’ trip through my old neighborhood a while back. I paused in front of the A.L. Holmes grade school. It wasn’t new when my mother went there 100 years ago. And it was older yet when I went there 75 years ago and played football on the front lawn and baseball in … Continue reading Old School Names

Martin strolled through the resort. That’s what it was called, a resort, but actually it’s a trailer park…a nice trailer park, for sure, on a canal to the Gulf but, most importantly, it gets him under the soothing southern sun after months of snow-blown Michigan. Down to his T-shirt to open his ‘fifth wheel,’ he … Continue reading One Downsmanship

She leaned on the door frame to his office, lingering, reluctant to leave. Matt studied her. Different now from their discussion a few minutes ago on the flyer she had asked him to design. He’d worked with Julia for years saying ‘hi’ in the hallways, in cafeteria clutches, on projects. But they had never slid … Continue reading A Quick Spark and Out

Did you ever walk into a room, maybe in an abandoned house, and feel a buzz, a kind of ‘ohmmm’? That’s what I felt standing in the middle of the Greek temple in Segesta. No roof. Fluted columns on all four sides, pointing up and out as much as around. A holy space, a launch … Continue reading In Search of the Buzz