2020 began with people alive with anticipation of the new decade and ended with people worldwide exhausted and anxious for change and relief. 2021, at least in the United States, didn’t start out with the calm most people hoped for; political unrest and the Capitol riot were capstones to the chaos that left so many people on edge, wondering what the next thing would be.

For many people in “developed” nations, the worldwide pandemic, race riots, and political and civil unrest are the most traumatic things they’ve ever experienced. They hit over and over again with unrelenting force. …

Little Kavita Laghari was born in Shanivarasanthe, India in 1941 — the first child born in the village that year. Her mother came from a royal bloodline that was ousted by Ahmad Yar Khan when he took over the rule of Baluchistan (now in Pakistan) in 1933. They sold what they could and used the money to get as far away as possible, even though travel under British rule was difficult. Their money was nearly exhausted when they arrived in Shanivarasanthe in the Southern Indian district of Kodagu, Karnataka.

Being royalty was the only skill Kavita’s parents had. They spent…

In 63 BC, Pompey laid siege to Jerusalem. 70 years later, the Romans are still in charge, oppressing the people; only allowing most of them to eek out a meager existence.

A warm summer breeze blows from the South, carrying the distinct scent of the fish markets around the Sea of Galilee to the surrounding hillside. Hundreds of people are seated in a semi-circle listening to a man most only know as an itinerate preacher, a man called Jesus from Nazareth, as he teaches what would be known more than a millennia later as the Beatitudes.

As his sermon draws…

Disclaimer: I think life coaches, health coaches, business coaches — the good ones anyway — are worth every penny they’re paid to help people feel good about themselves and what they are accomplishing. However, so many of them have the same thing in common. I’ll get to that in just a moment.

My wife is a health coach, and a pretty good one at that. She has a large clientele. She has made helping people find purpose in their health journey her mission. She has been blessed with a gift for relating to people. I applaud her for her work.

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For anyone over about the age of 9, undergoing a tonsillectomy can be a major ordeal. I’ve heard tales of adults who are essentially incapacitated by the procedure for a month or longer. Compare that to younger children, particularly those 5 and younger, who can bounce back in a few days, and be completely healed in under two weeks.

When my oldest daughter was 13 years old, she had to have her tonsils removed. We knew it would be a rough experience, but we had no idea how bad it was going to be.

The first day, before the intravenous…

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Recently, I signed up to participate in the Amazon Halo’s early release program. According to Amazon’s website, the Amazon Halo is a “Health and Wellness Tracker” that can “measure body composition, activity, sleep, and tone of voice.”

Some people might use the term revolutionary to describe the device because it doesn’t have a face on which to view your vitals and it makes use of microphones to track your vocal inflections to see if it can accurately guess your mood.

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A few days ago, one of my children practically insisted that we watch “Avengers: End Game”. Again. At this point, there are large segments of the movie I can quote. Sometimes in my sleeep.

I admit, I love a good superhero movie. There’s great escape watching beings with fantastic powers defeat other-worldly foes. A well-crafted movie offers many opportunities to suspend disbelief and get sucked into the drama and action.

It’s perhaps too easy, however, to lose ourselves in a world of make believe; where the “good team” always triumphs and all the heroes — well, most of them anyway…

There are 9 major parts to a human eye: the Sclera (that’s the white part), the Cornea (a window, of sorts, that covers the iris and pupil), the Pupil (where the light gets in), the Iris (the eye’s shutter), the Lens (the part that focuses the light), the Retina(a ten-layer membrane of cells that detect light and transform it into electrical impulses), the Macula (part of the Retina that receives the light focused by the Lens), the Optic Disk (the entry point of the Optic Nerve into the eye) and the Optic Nerve (the part that carries the electrical signals…