If living in homes that have skirting had long condemned me to the outskirts of society, constructing 2,000 square feet of community acceptance did not, as the lads from Liverpool famously intoned “come easy.” At all. Gassed up by imagined stigma and compelled to provide…
by Mark Patterson Stop eating my life in 30 second portions. At 68, I have precious little of it left-and none, ZERO, (in math terms the “empty set) has been given, signed over, or bequeathed to you. My time is…
…….The heartbreak of learning that the Hancock County school system that everyone supported is teetering on financial collapse is real. It simply hurts and since we don’t have all the facts, we don’t know who to blame. We just know that we trusted the administration,…
……I’m celebrating my ability to handle all the trappings of Christmas on my very own and that includes taking all those trappings down and putting them away. Some women tell me once they are alone they scale down decorations, some not even putting up a…
by Mark Patterson Something of a scoundrel-albeit a charming one-my dad played the ponies throughout most of his adult life. Please consider that this was long before legalized sports-betting slapped a veneer of legitimacy on the sort of “financial speculation” that sometimes results in dining…
There are a lot of challenges ahead for Hancock County in 2026. At this point the most pressing challenge is rectifying the financial crisis in the Hancock County School system. …….Despite the meetings I’ve attended and the research I have done, I’m still baffled by…
by Mark Patterson We embarked with nervous excitement. A somewhat familiar 40-minute drive would take us 5 miles north to route 30, at which point a hard right would head through Clinton, with just several more minutes to our destination, the Pittsburgh International Airport. All…
……Christmas is all about memories. The magical ones live forever in our hearts. Unfortunately, death, tragedy and sickness observe no holiday and those memories also take up space in our memory bank emerging at unexpected moments. But time often softens the edges of the memories…
by Mark Patterson In the early 19th century, Washington Irving, who wrote such classics as The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and Rip Van Winkle, set his fabled pen to Christmas, with a public service in mind: to call out the use of the holiday as an…