The Keener Way

       Typically, I'm not a short story person. I start writing what I think will be a short story, and it turns into a trilogy. Without fail. But this morning, I came up with an idea, and I think it actually stayed short.   The concept is simple. I know a lot of people who are married, a lot who are dating, a lot who have been in relationships in the past but broke up for whatever reason. Some break up and try again far too soon, without learning and growing from their mistakes, risking breaking again, while others break and then choose to build a wall, convinced that its not worth the pain.   So I wanted to write a little story to illustrate that sometimes, it can take a long time to find your people. Sometimes you think you've found your people, only to realize you've hit a dead end once again. Sometimes your people are the ones who are already around you and you simply need to open your eyes and see them. And perhaps some are simply created to walk the ...

  The scene you are witnessing is a view not dissimilar to what I imagine the Hebrews experienced as they exited the Arabian wilderness and approached the Promised Land. It is, in fact, a view of leaving the Great Sand Dunes National Park and approaching the peaks of the beautiful San Isabel State Forest. I woke up on Tuesday, June 1, 2024, with a very woeful anguish inside, knowing that this was my last day in Colorado. Tomorrow, I would be taking my east-bound roadtrip. Dreaded for being multiple thousand miles, and dreaded for going into later timezones. It would feel significantly longer than coming. Yet that was not today, that was tomorrow. I still had one more day to play hard and adventure fully. And I was going to make the best of it. Assembling a group of four, we first headed to Walmart for a supply of bananas. Why? Don't ask. We simply randomly decided that we needed some bananas, and that's all there was to it. Once our mission was accomplished, we happily munched ...

  So, to continue from the last story, how did we manage to walk ourselves into a spectacular view of sunset over Nipple Mountain, while wandering around in the Pueblo downtown? Well, after exploring Garden of the Gods and touring Glen Eyrie Castle, we headed to Cave of the Winds Adventure Park. The first agenda was to take some pictures from the parking lot, because the view was still as breathtaking as ever. Step two of the adventure was to do some rock wall climbing, Geronimo's leap, and a high ropes course. But wouldn't you know it, an afternoon thunderstorm rolled in, closing all the attractions right before we started. So we strolled around inside the visitor center, looking at the gift shop, watching the rain and lightning, and talking about life, till the storm finally blew over and we stepped out on a balcony to take pictures of the canyon below us while waiting for the attractions to re-open. Thirty minutes after the last lightning, the adventure park activities final...