I never meant to cause you any sorrow I never meant to cause you any pain I only wanted to one time to see you laughing …in the purple rain –Prince, 1984 Why Are Gen X men dying at such an alarming rate? A new study reveals that white, middle-aged men who were between...
I get so sad remembering the Oklahoma bombing, but I never get sad when I think of Jill. I met her during my years at Southern Nazarene University. She was a member of the Class of 1991. I graduated in 1990. RIP Beautiful Jill. I know you're with our Lord.
Pick the day as you would a poppy. -- Cicero In 2006, Jennifer Dawson, a 35-year-old wife and mother, died without warning from an undiagnosed heart condition. She was living in Brooklyn, New York at the time with her husband and children, a son, 2 and a daughter, 8....
Twenty years ago this month, Oklahoma teenager Monique Daniels was reported missing. About a year ago, someone who knew Monique wrote to me about her disappearance. A few months later I wrote this commentary for KOSU Radio, the text of which I'm publishing for the...
"As the wind ripped the roof off one of the bathrooms, and debris rained down on the children, they remained calm, singing 'You Are My Sunshine'..." Another Oklahoma Disaster. God Help Us. For the second time this year, I have to explain to my kids why a bunch of kids...
{ We are just four people who like to make music together and thus...pass on a piece of God's love. -- La Diju } For nearly 30 years, I have loved the song No Surrender by Bruce Springsteen. Well, now young faces grow sad and old And hearts of fire grow cold We swore...
What are life's most difficult questions? Read on to discover one of mine. Esther Cepeda, a columnist for the Chicago Sun Times, wrote an article recently about Gen Xers coming into their own.< Here is an excerpt: “Because they live in the shadow of both...
Ninnekah is a Choctaw word. It means night or darkness. On a dark night in Ninnekah, under the Choctaw sky, Tonya Rodgers called her boyfriend from a payphone. It was the last phone call she ever made. That evening in the spring of 1990, she was raped and murdered by...
For the Yamboree Queen Teri Smith, Yamboree Queen 1984 My mom recently made a trip to California. Before she left I sent her an email. I had something pressing I wanted to tell her: Dearest Mom, I'm glad you've been with me all these years. October Orange If I try...
Every Sunday, my father, who was a minister, got up early to shine his shoes and iron his shirt. He put on his best suit and always let me pick out his tie. Without fail, he'd tuck a tiny antique bottle full of olive oil inside his coat pocket. Once I asked him why he...
It's been 14 years since the Oklahoma City Bombing. Here are some pictures I took the other day. Oh, it seemed like a holy place, Protected by amazing grace And we would sing right out loud The things we could not say... --From Sad Cafe by the Eagles
Joe and Jennifer - May 19, 1985 The night Joe all but died he joked with his best friend, Johnny, that I was probably traipsing across the globe reporting on the toppling of some Marxist regime. Johnny said Joe was laughing and talking into a make-believe TV camera...