Opinion

Statistics show that nearly 3 in 10 Americans actually make New Year’s resolutions in an effort to hold themselves accountable. Such a practice is not new. Some 4,000 years ago, the ancient Babylonias made annual promises to the gods to pay their debts and...

This is undoubtedly my favorite day of the year. There are no gifts to worry about and you don’t even get mad at the kids. This day is one of the very best days that God allowed us. You don’t have to buy presents...

The obvious symbol for the month of February is, of course, the heart. This ideograph — represented by an anatomically inaccurate shape, by the way — appears on greeting cards, love letters and ever-popular, emoji-filled texts. Yes, February is all about love, especially romantic love,...

It’s the call no parent ever wants to receive. Saturday night and you are relaxing at home. You receive the news that your child has been in a bad car accident far away from home and is trapped in the wreckage. Time stopped still...

Excuse me if I am a little maudlin this week. Lots of things happening and most of them are about where I am in life. Have you ever sat down to reflect on your position and what went right or wrong? I’m not a particularly...

At Cal State Monterey Bay, we recently reached a milestone that speaks to the power of higher education as well as the future strength of California’s workforce. For the last 10 years, the California State University system has taken on an ambitious challenge, the...

When I worked in the newspaper industry, the obituary page was allegedly the paper’s most popular page, which, in my younger years, I found a little curious. Now I am — ahem — a little less young, I totally get it. These days I...

There are few guarantees in life. One thing you can count on, however, is change. Constant change. I equate real estate with life. It’s always up and down, forever moving, seldom boring. I have now been working in California real estate for 20 years,...

Last Sunday one of the readers of this column listened, patiently I suspect, to my not uncommon lament of having a deadline in the near future and not a single word written, whereupon he responded that I say that every week and every week...

It was on one of the local online groups, ordinarily used for lost dogs or downtown incidents. The lady said that she had never asked for anything before and yet she really needed some help this year for her children. She had been laid...