Category: Opinion

~a column by Colleen O’Brien The sight of my first palm tree when I stepped off the plane in San Diego as a young Navy bride hit something so familiar in my mind that it took me by surprise: I had been romanticizing palms since my preschool encounter with the line drawings of them in Kahil Gibran’s The Prophet, a…

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien I’ve been stacking rocks for some time . . . since the mid-1990s when I found myself doing it without plan or thought. I was in a slough of despond after my sister-in-law Ellen died of AIDS and there I was in my front yard wandering around like a sad dog. It was a bad…

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien A note from the columnist – It’s difficult to keep up with the goings-on from on high, especially if one wants to write about it. As soon as I sent this manuscript in, it was out of date. Consider it a historical column. COB Now that we are in the middle of making America great again,…

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien I have long held a romantic view of all things Espanol, perhaps from being a Spanish major long ago. It holds to this day – the people, the language, the music, the terrain of south of the border. For reasons I cannot explain, probably a mere lack of will, I have never been to Spain…

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To the editor, The summer school staff at the Greene County Schools would like to thank the following businesses that donated so our summer school students could have snacks: Hy-Vee, $30 gift card;  Fareway, 200 granola bars; and ShopKo, $30 gift card. Julie Neal, Greene County Schools reading specialist

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien The GOP’s anti-healthcare bill has been dropped for lack of votes. It was the Democrat’s fault according to the leader of the pack. It really wasn’t. It was outright rebellion from within; but let’s hear it for the Democrats anyway, for none of them were interested in voting for it.

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien I have been investigating uplifting news, trying to find it, in fact, as if it were a crime being sought out by a Woodward and Bernstein team of investigative journalists. There is some uplifting news; in fact, there’s enough actually to uplift us in a time of low-grade fever that awakes us in the AM…

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien Some serious folks think that reading fiction is beneath them, non-fiction being the stuff of the truly brainy. But recent studies from a fellow at the University of Toronto reveal that reading fiction “influences” one’s “empathetic response in the real world.” So says researcher Keith Oatley of the Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development…

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien In planning for a luncheon, one of my friends asked, “What should I bring?” The hostess said, “Let’s take our chances and make it a true potluck. Bring whatever you want.”

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien I’ve been dreaming for three months about my trip to Havana in September. Now I am thinking it was a good idea I’m going to miss out on it through no fault of my own. It seems I may not get there because of a new decision from the current administration.

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien The word “dexterous” if applied to you would be a compliment, no matter what the reference – sports, writing, driving, climbing trees, organizing children: “She is dexterous with the tennis racket…the pen… the preschoolers….” Dexterous means that you are adroit, skillful, clever, artful, deft, that you have mental skill and quickness, that you work with…

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~a column by Colleen O’Brien Cemeteries in the U.S. have a familiar look to them – grassy gravel roads winding casually or plotted in neat grids, rows of rectangular gravestones with the occasional marble angel and limestone tree with a squirrel in it. There are usually two or three house-like mausoleums for the wealthy of old. The lovely fir trees,…

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