Category: Ruminations

Ruminations

Bob Centamore: 1942 – 2019

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

The world has lost a good man as my old friend and mentor, Bob Centamore, was called home to the Lord on May 31st. He was 76. I’ve rarely seen Bob since he and his wife Margaret retired to North Carolina. Although he and I were linked on FacePalm™, we hadn’t had much interaction since he moved south. Yet I am deeply saddened by his passing, even while having every confidence in the sure hope of Bob’s eternal life with God in Christ. I am of course hardly unaware of the frailty and fleeting nature of our earthly existence, but it’s still hard to accept. M...

Ruminations

Goodbye to Another Electronic Friend

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28 years ago, on a cold January Saturday, I dragged my family out to an audio dealer at the Auburn Mall to replace a pair of AKG K240 headphones that had become almost unusable after about a dozen years. Tonight, after buying an adapter that would allow me to use them with my smaller-profile devices, I dusted off those replacement headphones to put them on, and discovered that the left channel was dead. I was shocked. For the first time in 40 years, I do not own a set of working K240s. The world as I’ve known it is falling apart!! As the artifacts ...

Ruminations

Mr. Garnett: I’m Sorry, and Thank You.

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

My first year at Natick High School was 10th grade, beginning in September, 1975. I had an English teacher that year by the name of Mr. Garnett – Harry Garnett, as I would soon know him as. Not that I ever called Mr. Garnett by his given name; he was always Mr. Garnett in person. He dressed in the modestly dapper style that older public school teachers adopted in those days – the men especially. He wore glasses than sat low on his nose, so he could peer over the top of them out at the class. He was a bit heavy, in the usual spot, and had a full head of v...

Ruminations

Some Concluding, Year-End Musings on 2012

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

Logos: Logos Bible Research scored huge in my estimation this year. I had struggled to be productive with earlier versions of their software, but version 4, released just about 3 years ago, represented a dramatic improvement in usability and performance, and I started drifting toward it then – especially since they were also beginning to release quality Catholic resources (e.g. works by Aquinas). Then, this Spring, they put together a series of terrific Catholic base packages, all of which included an outstanding edition of the Catechism of the Catholic ...

Ruminations

On the Satisfaction of Devotion

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

A friendly hand fell lightly upon my shoulder one January morning several years ago, as I was spending a few extra minutes before the tabernacle, after finishing Morning Prayer. I was running behind schedule that day, but since at least the beginning of the new school year, my old friend had apparently also been coming to the church quite a bit later than she used to, because it seemed to have been the better part of a year since we’d seen each other. I’d wondered about her now and again over the previous few months – wondering if her h...

Ruminations

Chuck Colson: 1931-2012

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

We lost a good man today. Read a few parting words from his co-workers on his recent project, The Manhattan Declaration, here – and sign the declaration if you haven’t yet, and if you care about marriage and human civilization (pardon the redundancy). Dostoyevsky said “The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.” I would add that you can judge the degree of civilization in a man’s soul by observing how he treats prisoners. With all that Colson did for his God and for his neighbors over the ...

Ruminations

Who has time to listen?

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

Rummaging through some old journals this week while taking a measure of introspection, I came across the following in an entry from March 29th, 1990. I’ve cleaned it up a bit for publication, but it remains essentially the thought of my 29 year-old self. Reading old journals is a fascinating exercise in self-awareness, but I’m throwing them out, anyway… Who has time to listen? Running around in hectic disarray, death edges closer to each of us by the minute, yet who has time to stop to listen? What would we hear if we did? Common wisdom has it that we le...

Ruminations

Peeking Into the Past

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Having reached the end of my second Franciscan University course a couple weeks ago following a mad rush of activity, I’ve found myself wandering a bit aimlessly, contemplating my next move. Over the weekend, I ended up rummaging through a series of old journal entries from the mid-90’s, and came across a handful of comments I’d like to save from the dustbin: I was able to drive more sanely today. I have many such improvements in mind. 3/5/96 It’s important to make your life worth living; it’s important to live for something worth dying for. ...

Ruminations

EPT (Eastern Pretend Time)

Posted on by John W Gillis / 0 Comment

So begins what is perhaps the toughest week of the year for me. The annual screwing up of the clocks began yesterday, and if history is any teacher, it will take me a week or so to regain my equilibrium. Until then, I pay the price. And I’m not the only one: my early-bird daughter Rebecca did not get out of bed until 9:00 (pretend time) this morning, having become obviously discombobulated over the weekend (and not being able to get to sleep until after 10:00 PM last night). In either a stroke of good luck or of insightful planning, her school had no ses...

Ruminations

Tempus Fugit

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MaybeToday.org turned two years old last Monday (March 1st). I spent the evening out with my wife, celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary. Having been married on Feb 29th, we usually get our choice of dates on which to celebrate the remembrance, although we don’t often wait until the 1st. We had a nice dinner at Restaurant 45 in Medway, and as is customary on the occasion, it served as a quiet opportunity for recollection, reflection on the past, and for taking stock of how things are going. On the drive home up Rt. 16, while passing a road in Ho...