'Food for the journey' a book that feeds the soul

   POINT RICHMOND, Calif. - Joseph B. Lynch's latest book, Food for the Journey, Essays on What I Have Learned along the Way, delivers plenty of sustenance for the soul.
     But before I launch a laudatory review of this fascinating book, a disclosure: Joseph Lynch is a friend - and my brother-in-law.
     Because of those two things, at first I didn't think I would write a full review. A squib on Amazon, perhaps. Conflicts of interest are rife in the journalism business where I hang my professional hat.
     But as I read through the book I kept discovering more and more revelatory stories, concepts and thinking I wanted to encourage people to sample.
     It's an amazing compendium.
     I've written many hundreds of book reviews over the decades. Some were of best sellers, many of lesser known authors. But this is my first review of book that blends religion, personal experience and scripture so neatly and inspirationally.
     If inspirationally caught you by surprise, read the second sentence again. I did say laudatory.
     The book's preface and introduction are key to understanding why the book appears now. This book was written by someone who has read entire libraries, it seems.
     It's a spiritual memoir, but contains many of the trademarks of regular memoirs. There are details about his growing up, education, family, emotional growth and, of course, a life of spiritual practice.
     Perhaps most impressive is the intensive level of research and connection among people and ideas Joe makes throughout the entire book. (He is my brother-in-law, so I can call him Joe in a review. No need to call him Lynch.)
      Joe cites experts across a wide range of philosophy, psychology, history, science and theology delving deeply into explaining things in a comforting, non-judgmental fashion.
     After reading the book over several days, the word comforting jumps to the front of line when I have to find a single word to describe it.
     Food for the Journey, Essays on What I Have Learned along the Way, can be read straight through like any book. But it also can be sampled.
     Be prepared, however, to read a chapter and need to put the book down while you ponder what you read and how it applies directly to your life.
     In my reading, out of the book's 16 chapters, that happened about, oh, 15 times.
     Food for the Journey, Essays on What I Have Learned along the Way has a quote from Francis Bacon in the postscript at the end of the book. A printed copy of Bacon's words now hangs on my bulletin board at eye level where I am writing now.

"Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man."

     Reading Food for the Journey, Essays on What I Have Learned along the Way is a good start on that path.

--- Michael J. Fitzgerald

Thanksgiving weekend ends, diet starts tomorrow (or Tuesday, or...)

SACRAMENTO, California, USA - The wonderfully long Thanksgiving weekend is almost over. Adm. Fox and I just finished a dinner of leftovers with Dr. Pam and Steve. And tomorrow night, we might actually have to cook a complete, fresh meal.

Son Dylan helps with T-day dessert

It was fun time, with children and friends coming and going in and out of the house faster than characters in a Harold Pinter play. At times, it seemed like it was a Harold Pinter play.

Thanksgiving Day itself, we went to Steve's sister's house in Loomis where we joined with probably 40 members of the extended family for a big dinner that included pasta with a meat sauce (and venison in the pasta).

Friday, the house and yard were taken over by Christmas decorating - serious Christmas decorating. Like a general commanding her troops, Dr. Pam had various children, nephews, other relatives and friends all setting up Christmas items on the front lawn.

The pre-teenage boys especially liked hanging out of second story windows - and climbing on the roof.

Dad and Jason

By Friday afternoon, the house was decorated with the finishing touches. Electric lights went on today (Sunday).

It turned out also to be an all-family weekend for the Fox-Fitzgeralds, too. Son Dylan arrived Tuesday to help with the baking of many pies for the festivities.

Wednesday, son Jason arrived to have breakfast and fill us in on his adventures as a coach in Michigan - with snowboarding adventures to start next week in Vail, Colorado.

Sami, Grandpa Michael and Kami

And today we were able to catch up with daughter Anne at her Rancho Cordova house with husband Steve and granddaughters Sami and Kami. Sami is now slightly taller than her mother - and probably two inches taller than Adm. Fox.

At one point, three-year-old Kami asked me to read her a third book, and when I said I was too tired, she grabbed the bag of Doritos we were munching together and said, 'No reading, no chips, Grandpa.'

She probably has a future as a hostage negotiator.

Below are three photos of the Lovotti house - one sans decor, the other with.  And at the bottomw, a photo of the house all lit up. (Like a Christmas tree?)

At the top - the house at 10 a.m. then at 2 p.m and below - all lit up

Writing and receiving letters - real letters - not emails

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - The mail arrived today at the post office around the corner and there, buried between political ads for California gubernatorial candidates (Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman), was a letter from my sister Anne.

A letter! And actual piece of paper, tucked neatly in a small envelope with a first class, forever stamp affixed in the corner.

A 'forever' stamp

The letter was in response to a missive I sent last week (a real letter, too), when I decided that sending electrons across cyberspace in an email to communicate was getting tiring.

Of course, writing a letter, printing it out (my handwriting is beyond atrocious), addressing an envelope and then - gasp - taking it to the post office, had its tiring moments, too. But there is something soooo satisfying about dropping a letter into the mailbox to be delivered. And it's even more satisfying when you receive a letter.

I know my granddaughters Samantha and Kami love to get mail, and from time to time, I dash off a letter, usually adding a sheet of stickers and sometimes some photos - or even toys.

My late mother wrote letters every week of her life. And at Christmas, her card list had more than 300 people - old roommates from college, relatives and professional acquaintances with whom she had become friends. Starting sometime in early November she would pen a few cards every day, sending them out with personal messages to each person, inquiring about families and health and other such things.

Not all responded, though I remember our roadside mailbox in Lakewood, New York being quite full in the spring, as people wrote her back.

For me today, the best part is holding the letter I just received, then setting it in a place of honor, from which it can be picked up and read again later. And read again.

I have a full sheet of first-class, forever stamps, waiting to be put to good use, as I type this. Perhaps it's time to leave the world of electrons and get put together another real letter.

A busy fall: teaching, grandkids, kids, amigos, music & dancing

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - The fall is whizzing by - and it isn't even actually fall yet.

But since returning to Sacramento nearly four weeks ago, Admiral Fox and I have barely stood still long enough, to, well, stand still.

We've visited with our amigos and hosts, Steve and Pam, a lot, (though their schedules rival ours). We've also hit the Bay Area (where we visited with son Dylan and Dan & Lorraine Olsen), seen Chief Engineer Scott Noble and his wife, Counsel Jen Noble, several times, and as much as possible, visited with daughter Anne and family.

Last week we went to a fundraiser luau for granddaughter Sami's softball league. It was a riot, even when Sami tagged her father square in the head with a whipped cream pie tin that turned out to be a little harder on the edge than it was supposed to be.

You can see the result of her pitching arm - and how much head wounds do bleed - in this video.




Kami lifting luau game tickets - while I'm not looking


Son-in-law Steve after his turn in the pie booth

The week before that, we went to daughter Anne's casa in Rancho Cordova for Kami's third birthday fete. It was a lot fun, and the weather cooperated to let us be outdoors for the entire evening party.

We gave Kami some percussion instruments (a drum, mariachis, tambourine, bracelets with bells, etc), much to the chagrin of her parents and other grandparents who quickly suggested that Kami bring those toys to our house, where they could reside.

No deal, we said.

Here's a short video of that party:




Kami with her birthday cake

While Admiral Fox and I have been scurrying about every day - trying to keep up with full teaching loads along with all this other fun - we have squeezed in some music and dance.

The dance has been by Adm. Fox's who has become addicted to an exercise class called Zumba. This   new dance program is getting worldwide notice. She hits three or four Zumba classes a week and has signed up to become certified as a Zumba instructor next month.

Hang on Mexico, Zumba and Adm. Fox will arrive in December.

My dancing has been limited to shuffling around our upstairs apt. most often to Frank Sinatra singing New York, New York or some other sedate tune. But I have picked up the ukulele plenty I and hope to get back into it much more, now that life has settled down.

Settled down. Who am I kidding?

In and among all this fun, we have also been dealing, long distance, with our Mexico land problem and have moved ahead - along with a number of our neighbors in Tenacatita - to file for federal injunctions against the developer who seized the entire Tenacatita beach area, evicting 800 people in the process.

Mexican media have been covering for nearly two months as a national story. It's a land grab that is breathtaking even for Mexico. Canadian media recently ran the story, too. So far, despite all my contacts in the American press, no major newspaper or wire service has picked it up.

Too busy chronicling the hijinks of the Tea Party, I suppose.

But for people interested in a relatively depressing update, well, here's the link:

LINK: Vancouver Sun on the Tenacatita takeover

Car crashes, classes and city clatter - welcome home!

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - The Admiral and I have been back in Sacramento for a little more than two weeks and already packed in two road trips (San Francisco for a birthday dinner and Camp Connell for a Four Headlamps reunion), taught two weeks worth of university classes, and dealt with matters automotive.

Because our two Mexico vehicles are in, well, Mexico, we are relying on the little red Nissan truck that I purchased new in 1990. With 105,000 miles on it, it's practically a new vehicle, except that it lacks one necessary accessory for this latitude (and this time of the year): an air conditioner.

When I bought the Nissan in February of 1990, air conditioning seemed like such a luxury. Today, driving to the university in 100-degree heat, it didn't seem so.


Nissan gets a new muffler

When we picked up the Nissan from its winter, spring and summer home at Ruth and Brian Gray's house in Murphy's it was obvious that either Brian had put on a new hot rod muffler or - and more likely - the muffler had a hole in it the size of Rush Limbaugh's mouth.

The Rush's-mouth theory won out when I inspected it and we made a quick trip to a muffler shop in South Sacramento, where we had a new muffler installed. When I went to pay the bill, I thought I had accidentally warped to Mexico. It was $53, total.


Fender bender near our Sacramento house

No matter where you live, people always seem to claim that the worst drivers in the world live there.

Sacramento is no exception, except there's evidence that people do drive like maniacs, particularly on the freeways that criss-cross the town like a tic-tac-toe board. The Admiral and I have had a few close calls, but mostly been witness to numerous cases of horns blaring, people shouting and much wild gesturing involving fingers. One fellow swerved across three lanes of traffic to shout at me because he thought I was going to swerve into his lane.

Three lanes!

Luckily, we have two bicycles (my ancient KHS and a borrowed unit from Sanders Lamont) to provide most of our local transit. Less time on the freeway and less wild gesturing of fingers and shouting will be good.


One of my classes at CSU, Sacramento

Admiral Fox has already started her countdown-to-Mexico calendar, now that we have two Sacramento weeks behind us. I'm a little more sanguine and won't get really excited for, say, another week or two.

Part of the reason is my four classes are taking up much of my attention - as they always do at the outset of the semester. But the other is we are seeing our granddaughters Sami and Kami more and they are a hoot to be with.

This morning I spent an hour chatting with daughter Anne while granddaughter Kami decorated my head with her collection of plastic bugs.


Kami at her birthday party last week

I will really miss her decorative skills this winter and spring while I'm in Mexico and real bugs are climbing on my head.

But that's, oh, three months from now.