Accountability and #365wordstolive

I shared a shift in how I look at goals in my previous post, #365wordstolive. My Facebook and Instagram feeds reflect that shift over the past week. I wanted to share some more insight into what you are seeing and how it came to be. I began 2020 journaling in the Day One journaling app. It is easy to use and flexible. I found myself…

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#365Wordstolive

2020. the dumpster fire of a year, was kicked out the door at midnight. It did not go out with much fanfare but with a sigh of relief.  It would be nice to say that it is history. It never will be. 2020 will live on for years in our memories, changes in our lives, and stories. Most of us are grazing on the last…

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Tom’s top 3 bicycle touring reads of 2020

Reading books lingered on my list of habits I wanted to develop. Setting goals, a celebrated New Year’s ritual, is good but developing a habit is better. Habits sustain goals and yields lasting benefits. Early this year, I discovered Goodreads, an online community of readers sharing book reads, recommendations, and reviews. Members build virtual bookshelves of their library. A feature that spoke to me was…

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Thanksgiving then and now

Thanksgiving grocery shopping, like all my mother’s grocery expeditions, was driven by a battle plan that George Patton would have admired. She scanned the Alliance Review Persky’s Market, Kroger, and A&P ads for the best deals. On Saturday morning, my siblings and I tagged along into battle as her foot soldiers with hopes of sugary treats finding their way into the shopping cart. Thanksgiving in…

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Elections and politics

1968 was a tumultuous year in American history with race relations and civil unrest front and center. It was a presidential election year with Vice President Hubert Humphrey and Richard Nixon in a bitter fight for the presidency. I was a 14-year-old and unable to vote. I was a proud Republican in a strongly Republican family. Richard Nixon won that election. I celebrated the win….

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Ideological identity, faith, and the election

I have struggled with my Christianity for several years. I was a lifelong churchgoer heavily involved in the Church and advocacy for LGBT Lutherans in the Church. Bad experiences turned me away after 50+ years in the pews. The Reader’s Digest version is that Christians do not behave Christlike. I may struggle with Christians, but I am very faithful and believe in the tenets of…

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10.15.05

Heart disease is the leading cause of death for men, women, and people of most racial and ethnic groups in the United States. One person dies every 36 seconds in the United States from cardiovascular disease. About 655,000 Americans die from heart disease each year—that’s 1 in every 4 deaths. – Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Today is the 15th anniversary of my triple coronary bypass surgery. I suffered a mild…

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