Positively flummoxed
IDEAS
LITERATURE
LIFESTYLE
Old Things, New Perspectives
Where curiosity meets tradition
ANALOG VALUES
Memory, Resonance, Depth
The Ice Storm Cometh
Here in the Pacific Northwest, it’s all about the trees, at least when it comes to natural beauty, outdoor recreation, and occasionally… natural disaster. In the summer, fires rage through our forests with increasing frequency, casting a dingy, orange veneer over the...
A Season for all Things
It’s autumn and the leaves are changing. Weeding in the garden, I see a bank of clouds roll over Mary’s Peak, darker than the pervading gray. I run inside to get my raincoat and then keep weeding, pulling clumps of grass out by mud-clad roots, thistles, old lettuces,...
The Road to Santiago
What do we search for, and why? This, I wondered, as I stood on the rooftop of the Cathedral of Santiago De Compostela, gazing down at the Puerta Santa, the Sacred Gate. I might have asked the two women with whom I was chatting; Swedish, but schooled in perfect...
The Crucible of Grace
Grace. Such a nice sounding word, isn't it? Something to put on a Hallmark card. A platitude, mundane, like the meal it precedes, the name of someone white, privileged, perhaps a little bland but thoroughly respectable. Grace calls to mind forgiveness, if only from...
America’s Best Idea
On January 6th, 2021, our Capitol was breached by a group of individuals claiming "the people's" house for their own. It is a day that will be written into our national history as one of tremendous significance, but just what we say about it remains to be seen....
Love and Loss: An Ode to 2020
It is loss, not possession, that delivers us to the essence of things. This has been a lifelong lesson. I am a connoisseur of loss, not by choice, but by nature and history. As I child, I felt deeply and therefore felt losses deeply. This, coupled with a tumultuous...
Scrooge’s Ghost
I am four years old. This is deep memory, the membrane stretched, gossamer-thin, over a reality I no longer inhabit. A young child’s world, full of wonder, danger, and mystery. Impressions linger: flour dusted over the countertops (did I sneak into the kitchen at...
Happiness: A Question
Happiness. What exactly is it? Webster tells me it's "the state of being happy," and provides the telling example, "she struggled to find happiness in her life." From this I conclude two things: happiness is self-referential and most commonly identified by its...
Literature
Baggins, who was feeling positively flummoxed, and was beginning to wonder whether a most wretched adventure had not come right into his house…
Ideas
Lifestyle
Follow Positively Flummoxed
Sign up to have new posts directed to your email. Feel free to unsubscribe at any time. Don’t forget to look for the authentication email in your inbox from Starr Creek Press! Click to confirm.
Contact me
I welcome ideas, guest posts, questions and comments. Send me an email and join the conversation about analog values, old books, new perspectives and timeless ideas. I'd love to hear from you. You can reach me at: