She’s the mother of my bride, Mum, or Mum Chamberlain, as I like to call her. I’m at her bedside. The children and my wife, Jean, are on live video from across the ocean, from East Africa. “We love you, Grams!” Jean shares greetings from the team of Save the Mothers, the Ugandan
Honouring the reach and heart of one mother Read More »
Today’s offering is about a dog. And children. And a couple of books and a movie. Seems like the right mix for Mother’s Day. The dog is Oscar, a friendly Shih Tzu Poodle wanting to be touched. There he is following me in the nearby cemetery where I often walk in the fresh morning light.
This Mother’s Day consider the blessing Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, February 13, 2016)
MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ It was over lunch in Dundas with my sister, somewhere between the spring rolls and the coconut shrimp, when the question came without any hint to suggest this would be one of those ‘aha’ moments that can be unpacked and looked at and handled for a lifetime.
“So of all the places you’ve been,” she asked, “what’s your favourite?”
I might have said Paris or Berlin or Seoul, or maybe Amsterdam or London or Istanbul, or maybe somewhere in the Mid-East or Africa …
Celebrating Family Day (and all the things that means) Read More »
(The Hamilton Spectator, Saturday, September 26, 2015)
MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ Our dog, Zak, is a fine-looking German shepherd with a deep bark and a good name. (I mean, if your name is all you can ever fully own, surely that’s true for dogs too.)
He’s wary of strangers and, I suspect, would give his life if called to. He has a funny relationship with his food, never uses his doghouse, (preferring our back door), and loves rolling in the morning dew.
Life is in the small pleasures, the simple moments Read More »
(The UCU Standard – Friday, November 1, 2013)
MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ Suicide is a shabby and shameful business, something that nice people don’t get mixed up in, yet here they are, two suicides in our university family, two young people who in separate incidents have left us with nothing but a disturbing ‘good-bye.’
What suicide can teach us about fear and living freely Read More »
It was a father-son weekend away of climbing and water and sports and night fires and running around a small island on the Nile River in the countryside of Uganda. And one of the boys stood by a swamp and held up some mud like it was a trophy, and then another boy said something
The Sons of Adam and the muddiness of family life Read More »
If I have one urgent piece of practical advice for young men today, it’s this: Look forward with great hope to the day you marry and have children.
For dads and dad-dads everywhere Read More »
“You’re such a Dad-Dad.”
This phrase, a recent favourite of my three-year-old Jon, has reminded me anew that there’s nothing like fatherhood.
A culture of fatherhood Read More »
