Elise Sereni Patkotak

In the best of times, which would be a time without war, being a military spouse is a challenge. You move a lot and you spend more time than you could possibly have imagined being a single parent.  It is not a calling for the faint of heart.

I just spent a few days with a military wife whose husband is on his third deployment in as many years. She is raising two small boys by herself for the next few months. But thanks to the advances of modern technology, her husband gets to be an active father in his

for what we’ve done to her beautiful gulf and its irreplaceable creatures. What will it take for us to realize that with our greed we are shitting in our only nest.

My godchild’s three year old insisted on calling me UncleEese. Either we really were unable to teach him that aunt was for ladies and uncle was for men OR I’ve finally gotten so old that all secondary sexual characteristics have been totally obliterated.

On the other hand, at least it’s better than his nickname for his aunt whose name he can’t quite pronounce and so she has become… now and forever as far as I’m concerned… CaCa.

There I was, walking down the strip opposite the Bellaggio in Vegas. The fountains were spurting as a woman sang what was admittedly a beautiful version of the Star Spangled Banner.  As she reached the high notes and the rockets red glare, the fountain spouted gushers higher than one would have thought possible. The whole show was obviously designed to cause you to gasp and remember anew why you loved America. 

Except it was hard to reconcile that patriotic fervor with the men on the corners handing out cards for strip clubs that boasted the most beautiful naked ladies in

I was in the elevator at my hotel in Vegas. It was during those awkward few moments when it’s just you and one other person, in this case a man, on the elevator and you are trying to pretend to casual nonchalance. I glanced to my left where a poster hung touting a show.  I thought I could pretend interest in it until we hit the lobby floor.  Then I realized I was staring at the dancer’s nipples, carefully encircled with glittering diamond-like jewels and held perkily up by the contraption holding the jewels and aspiring to be some sort

I never shop in a store where the dresses displayed would have to be combined by a multiple of three to have enough material to get around my body. 

Yes, it is entirely possible that if you try hard enough, you can make that penny slot machine take back every cent it gave you. The key to success is to just never give up… and I’m guessing that’s also the key to casino profits.

It’s pretty easy when confronted with some of the homeless in our town to forget that once they were children with hopes and dreams that probably didn’t include addictions or homelessness. Then you read about a vet whose belongings were dumped by the city because he didn’t move them fast enough. You can no longer ignore our common humanity when that vet says one of the things he lost was a checkerboard from his childhood that his father had carved from spruce.

The homeless are not unlike you and me except for some really bad luck or some really bad

I was at the grocery store the other day. A mother was there with two young children, a boy about 5 and a girl about 7. The boy wanted something. I couldn’t hear what. But I did very clearly hear his mother say that they had already discussed this and he knew the answer was no. Since I was pushing my cart down the aisle behind them, I could hear the little boy arguing the point. Mom remained firm. The young boy then chose to throw a full blown, loud, screaming hissy fit. Mom looked at him for a moment,

My sister spends the day working, leaving me alone to amuse myself in Vegas. And here’s the thing.  Vegas can be endlessly amusing at absolutely no cost. Grab a complimentary coffee while pretending to play the penny slot machines and then wander outside and sit. That’s all it takes. The world passes before you. And what a bizarre world it is.

Sometimes it seems as though we forget that despite all the political and religious differences that divide us, what really unites us is how we aren’t really anything like the people who seem to inhabit Las Vegas in every