The Day I Met Red Skelton ©2020 by Vernon Miles Kerr, VernonMilesKerr.com, WritersClass.net In 1967, I was managing a small finance-company on Indian Avenue in Palm Springs. At the time, Palm Springs was still a sleepy little community lazying in the shimmering desert heat at the very foot
California Highways
California Daydreamin’ © 2020, 2021 by Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com Loved those lyrics, “…don’t know whatcha got till it’s gone,” That’s the upside of Coronavirus— If there is one. For a California road-warrior, lockdown is hell. After wearing-out tons of tires — (In leaner times even down to
Altruism
Yin and Yang © 2018 by Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com writersclass.net As do the Yin and Yang, The black and white Of that ancient Asian dichotomy, The antipodes of Human Nature Revolve in nauseating monotony: Sumos exchanging brooding glares before the lunge. The meth-addicted darkness Rolls its empty sockets
Thanks for the Ride © 2020, 2023 by Vernon Miles Kerr, VernonMilesKerr.com Introduction An Autobiography of a Nobody Who Has Witnessed Amazing Things June 2023 In 2020, faced by the likelihood that someone my age wouldn’t be around much longer, I started this autobiography—but was soon distracted. Now
Government
Humanity’s Greatest Need: A Secular Morality ©2020 by Vernon Miles Kerr, VernonMilesKerr.com, WritersClass.net Today’s world is a world of deception. Politicians promise to bring Utopia if elected, fully knowing they cannot deliver. Once in office, they lie, pull dirty tricks or just vegetate — collecting a handsome
California Columnists
A Liberal’s Admonishment to Liberals An analysis of the Manfred Wolf Column, This Time, This Place for January 2020 (c) Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmilerskerr.com writersclass.net I previously featured one of Manfred Wolf’s earlier essays in this series of frank discussions with fellow liberals. See Here.. Dr.
Purpose and Reason: The Bible In Proper Perspective © 2020 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com writersclass.net A Reason It’s 5:58 am. I normally get up between 4:00 and 6:00 a.m., have my morning coffee and meditate. Sometimes my meditations turn into prayers, just in case
Agnosticism
The “I don’t know” of Agnosticism ©2020 by Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com As a scientist of sorts, (i.e. a Software Developer and Computer Systems-Integration Engineer) I can usually suppress any of my emotional-swings toward religiosity with a healthy dose of skepticism. If there’s a “Show-me State”
Boulder
Boulder © 2010, 2016, 2020 by Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com Quirky, busy little Boulder With its sprawling, yellow brick university And Nineteenth Centry business district, Spread out at the foot of the Flatirons. Those jutting stone slabs seem to grow out of Boulder Not visa-versa. They thrust upward beckoning the
Forrest Park
St. Louis © 2010, 2016, 2020 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com What on Earth can compare to the Arch? No superlative is adequate. Nothing prepares you for that first glimpse, No travelogue, no picture in the Nat. Geo. Soaring above the downtown skyscrapers, Its satin-silver face reflects The sky and clouds,
Japan
Tokyo ©2010,2016,2020 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com She is more than huge, she is blatantly contradictory. She’s American-ish, but Japanesey; Familiar but exotic; Traditional but wildly avant garde.; Savoring but guzzling; Giddily young but staidly elderly. Near Shinjuku station it’s girls in blue jeans And tiny
Barter-Economy
Sky Enigma ©2020 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com A lot of us don’t appreciate, or have completely forgotten, how our world became what it is today. It began at the Winter Solstice in 2033. Someone must have noticed it around midnight GMT. That was when mobile phones started buzzing
Anti-Morality in Academia
The Golden Rule One-size-fits-all © 2019 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com Most of the world’s negative aspects (except the ones Nature deals us) are caused by lack of morality. Organized religion shouldn’t have a monopoly on teaching morality; none of the world’s religions can even agree on an
Alabama
The Old House in Birmingham © 2003 Vernon Miles Kerr I only experienced that old house in Alabama, intermittently, for the first seven years of my life. I was brought there as a newborn from the hospital in 1943, spent a few months there in 1947 or 48 and then, finally,
Mortality
Turn Around ©2019 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com “Turn around, and you’re two, Turn around and you’re four, Turn around and you’re a young man, Going out of my door…” 1. We try to measure Time by watching growing-things Like kids and trees and patches of peeling
American Authors
Some Insight into an Inscrutable Man ©2019 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com When I was in high school I decided to become an English teacher. In my college freshman year, after reading The Catcher in the Rye, I decided to become a writer. I know I’m only one of