State park trail entry point.

Journey Home

Tales from the pilgrimage.

Local Events

  • Parade and Fragments

    A summer parade in Iowa is a chance to showcase lives for the entire community. Farmers, restaurateurs, insurance agents, bankers, retailers, construction companies, government organizations and more cleanup their equipment and parade it through town handing out treats and small gifts along the route. People line the street to watch, sitting on lawn chairs, standing… Read more

  • Independence Day 2019

    Happy Independence Day… reluctantly. I’ve not been a fan of the Independence Day holiday since military service. It’s not that I paid much attention to it previously. As a military officer I had time to reflect on the meaning of independence while stationed far from home among strangers. People celebrate the Declaration of Independence and… Read more

  • Marianne Williamson Close to Home

    About 11:15 a.m. I left the garden and drove Ely Blacktop to 76th Street and headed West to Cedar Hall on the main campus of Kirkwood Community College where presidential candidate Marianne Williamson joined State Senator Rob Hogg in a “climate conversation.” Since I would be returning to the garden after the event, I wore… Read more

  • Earth Day – 2019

    A thin haze dimmed reflected light from the moon. Thin enough to allow dots of starlight to penetrate the atmosphere and with moonlight illuminate the neighborhood. The haze was just enough to know it was there. I moved trays of kale, broccoli and parsley seedlings from the garage to a pallet near the driveway in… Read more

  • Flooding in Late Winter

    The amount of snow and ice melt in the Midwest is monumental. Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds issued disaster proclamations for 41 counties because of flooding (Click on the map to see details). News photographs show Offutt Air Force Base in Bellevue, Nebraska, home of the U.S. Strategic Command, is one third underwater with at least… Read more

  • Used Book Sale and Other Necessities

    Yesterday was the annual used book sale at our library. In addition to clearing the stacks of unpopular or outdated books, the community donates books, media and labor to manage the sale. Each item is reasonably priced and this year’s proceeds were about $800. That’s a lot of $0.50 and $1.00 books. I spent ten… Read more

  • Zach Wahls Solon Listening Post

    SOLON, Iowa — Snow began to fall about 10 a.m., an hour before the scheduled legislative listening post with our State Senator Zach Wahls. By the time I got to the community center, about three inches of fluff was on the ground. We live in Iowa. We began on time. It was a small gathering,… Read more

  • Lunar Eclipse

    Refracted light creating a reddish-orange hue on the moon’s surface looked pretty cool last night. It was an event to remember, one that transcended daily life. It drew many of us together with a shared experience. In the eclipse it was easy to imagine and literally see the vast emptiness of the universe. It reminded… Read more

  • Day to Day Politics

    Last June I broke publicly from our state representative Bobby Kaufmann and endorsed Democratic candidate Jodi Clemens for House District 73 in a letter to the editor of the Solon Economist. With a circulation of less than 1,000 weekly copies, I’m not sure my endorsement was widely read. I went on to post three additional… Read more

  • Build the Fire House

    I encourage readers to contribute financially to the fund to build a new fire station. During my four years as a Big Grove Township Trustee, where part of our work was to manage the Solon Tri-Township Fire Department, it became clear the need for a new facility is real. The current property tax levy will… Read more