Things that have changed:

ME

Things that haven't changed:

* The reek of Jack Daniels in Dad's pickup truck

* The flat, boring 12-minute drive between my house and my old high school

* The sound of the water as the wind blows it up against the banks at Smith Creek

* The long straight rows that line the fields as the corn pops up from the ground

*The bright yellows, purples, and blues of the wildflowers growing in the ditches of the gravel roads

*The smell of hot dogs, popcorn, dirt, and sweat at small town summer softball games

*The dirty sunweathered faces of the farmers that winkle when they smile at you

*The taste of an ice cold Busch Light enjoyed on the porch while watching the sunset after a long hot day

Of Course There's A Beaver Crossing, Nebraska!

Being abroad for 4 months, I didn't realize how much I missed my hometown. But oh how the memories of the first 18 years of my life came flooding back as I drove through town for the first time since January. When I left there was snow on the ground, now the grass is green and summer is edging its way in. The smell of the grass and the wild flowers and the dirt being churned by tractors, the smell of diesel engines and river water remind me of what it was like to be a kid when Beaver Crossing was my world and I knew nothing of what lay beyond. No New York City. No Washington DC. No Paris. Driving thirty minutes to Lincoln was a big day and visiting family an hour and a half west was a vacation. It feels good to remember the innocent child I used to be when I played on the streets of this town. Oh Beaver Crossing, how I missed you!

A creative new way of looking at radio

I really love what they do with this:

www.loveandradio.org

Choose

by Carl Sandburg

The single clenched fist lifted and ready,

Or the open asking hand held out and waiting.

Choose:

For we meet by one or the other.

Which one will you pick today?

Monday Evening

I sit here in the petite kitchen of my 8th arrondissement apartment eating a 2 minute dinner, drinking a glass of cheap red wine, and reading Le Deuxieme Sexe by Simone de Beauvoir. As I sit, I start to contemplate the last 4 months: Living in a foreign country, learning a new language, separating myself from everything that I knew and took comfort in. Learning what it means to be on my own all over again. I feel good when I think about it. I feel content when I look back. But now is a time for changing, and I must look forward as well. What is to come? I have plans but no definite answers. Only time will tell whether my assumptions will prove correct. Will I be as content looking back 4 months from now as I am right now? 

I hope so.

A Taste of Home

There were seven of us crammed into my tiny french kitchen. We were grilling burgers and enjoying a completely American kind of get together. We had brought our "steak hache" and our 10-packs of Kronenburg and Heineken and now we were crowded into the kitchen, watching our friend cook up our hamburgers just the way we liked them, medium rare. We turned my laptop into a makeshift TV and found a Mets-Brewers baseball game to cheer for while we savored our sandwiches and chugged our beer. We laughed at stupid jokes and sang silly cheers as we rooted for the the Mets. Not all of us were Mets fans and many of us don't watch baseball but that didn't matter because this night was not about the baseball; and it wasn't really about the burgers or the beer either. The night was about us. We are American and even though we are here in Paris right now, fully engulfed in a new culture and a different way of life, every once and a while we need to celebrate our silly American traditions and remember home...