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I Know What Love Isn't Review

It has been a long five years since Jens Lekman’s last full length album, “Night Falls Over Kortedala” and it has felt even longer. Thinking back, I don’t recall exactly how I got into Lekman but I believe that it was around 2009.  I was looking for something fun and I found it in Jens Lekman. In one of the first songs of his that I heard, he took the traditional advice of walking a thousand steps in someone else’s shoes before judging them and made a joke about how he was now one thousand steps away and judging the person anyhow.

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Grieving is the Price of Love and Friendship

One of the keys to living a human life is equally accepting the joys and the sorrows of our short time on this earth.  We love to celebrate good things like birthdays and marriages and births, but when it comes to the sadder side of bouncing on this mortal coil, we often turn inward and inky and ask for privacy, and sometimes, we might even feel ashamed for feeling desperate and undecided.  We need space and room to grieve because grief is the price we pay for love and friendship even though we may be reluctant to settle that barter.

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The Genesis of Wisdom

How do we become wise?  Is wisdom a gift, or is wisdom something practiced and acquired?  Does wisdom know any age?  Can a five-year-old child ever be wiser than someone who has lived 85 years?

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Marking a Marriage Milestone

Over the Summer, Janna and I were thrilled to spend another married year together as we celebrated our anniversary.  Our marriage is the number one greatest achievement of my life.  Sharing your life with someone is a massive challenge and every single day the relationship changes and re-breathes and moves again in sometimes unimaginable ways as once expressed in — Promise Before Dying — published in Urban Semiotic on July 18, 2005:

Then she asked me if I would bury her under a tree with shade when she died.

I promised her I would.

Then she asked me if I would bury her under a tree with shade that had leaves that change colors in the Fall from red to purple to orange.

I promised her I would.

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The Adele 21 Review

I am completely and totally in love with Adele — in the most honorable and humanistic way — and it is my delight to review her latest 21 album.  Yes, Adele is a SuperGenius SuperStar from the UK and, yes, she is only 22 years old.  Her voice is a throaty, smoky, raspy mix of the Bluesy heartache made famous by Fiona Apple, Rihanna and Janis Joplin.

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Unwittingly Taught, But Purposefully Caught: How Learning Civilizes You

Too often, when we place the self in the context of the greater world, we point outward instead of directing the fit inward. Today, I’d like to discuss the idea how learning civilizes you — the self — and not just the greater “ourselves.”

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Love by the Calendar: Grift in the Holidays Scam

Janna and I aren’t big on formal gift giving.  We have a saying that is frequently expressed in our marriage: “Every day is your birthday.”  That doesn’t mean we’re wild spenders — or that giving a “gift” to each other requires spending money — but it does change our perspective on the “Mandatory Holidays” that drive greeting card sales and generate increased prices for dining out while lowering prices on consumer goods like clothing.

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