The Spiritual Wanderer
Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Buzz Aldrin crewed the famous Apollo 11 mission to the moon.
Back when I was in kindergarten, I felt bad for Michael Collins. The other guys on his team got to do the most amazing thing humans had ever done. Yet Michael, who went along with them, didn’t get to do it. I asked my dad if Michael felt bad, but he assured me Michael was just fine. Read More…
Himesh Patel stars in Yesterday, a movie that asks the question, “what if only one man remembered The Beatles?”
You just … you just gotta buy the premise.
Once you do, once you’ve bought into the idea that a guy is suddenly thrust into a world where The Beatles don’t exist and haven’t existed, well, now you’re along for the magical mystery tour. (Sorry, I will do my best — I promise — not to throw in more references like that!)
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My daughter, Taylor, alternates with me between napping and driving across The Great Plains.
We just passed a shrink-wrapped boat. What it’s doing in the middle of Nebraska, I have no idea. But there seems to be all manner of transport along this flat, gray, rainy Pony Express trail.
My daughter sits next to me napping on her “Hug this pillow until you can hug me” fluffiness, given to her by her new hubby. It’s sweet. Even though we’re traveling at a pretty steady clip, we’re not taking great pains as we drive across The Great Plains. Destination: Cheyenne, Wyoming and her next three years. Why oming? Her Air Force husband just re-upped for duty and she’s got a job working with older folks at the Veterans Administration. Her new life awaits her. Read More…
Mom and Dad sat for one of my early portrait sessions back in the mid-1980s.
So I’m hanging out, chatting with my wife and daughter after running some errands, having a salty snack — the usual slow afternoon things — when KABLOOEY, it hits me; I’ve outlived my father.
Nothing stops The Spiritual Wanderer, as Rodney Curtis is known to readers far and wide from the title of his first humorous book about the many quirky challenges of life in America. Then, suddenly his life went from quirky to terrifying as he was hit with a double whammy: a layoff notice and a diagnosis of cancer. Many would have folded under the pressure, but Rodney’s approach to life remains undimmed. As he says in his introduction, he keeps laughing in the face of fear.
The shocking L-words struck like hammers: “Laid off,” then, “Leukemia.” Like millions of Americans, Rodney Curtis feared for his life and his family. But what that deadly acute leukemia didn’t know was: It was dealing with the Spiritual Wanderer, the columnist who is famous for finding humor and wisdom in daily life. Rodney started by renaming his foe: “A Cute Leukemia.” He explains, “Nothing makes cancer madder than belittling it and pinching its darling baby cheeks.” If you’d like to try chuckling in the face of your fears, join Rodney on his quest to recover both humor and health.
Who is the Spiritual Wanderer? He’s an ordinary person like you and me. When he crawls out of bed each morning, he needs to find a cup of frozen coffee before he can contemplate searching for spiritual answers in the cosmos. As his day unfolds, Rodney Curtis looks everywhere for meaning and hope–and always for humor. He wanders through the lives of people around him, through the streets with his beloved dogs and even searches for spiritual guidance in the lights high above us, although that winking glow up there sometimes turns out to be a streetlight. In these 40 short adventures with the Wanderer, you’ll likely find yourself standing very close to your own home.
