Personal Stories

By John Thompson Sometimes these days I find myself so full of joy and gratitude that I feel like I might just explode. That’s not hyperbole: I really am beside myself, wondering what to do with so much overwhelming energy. I still have my sorrows and grief, mind you, and my discontents, but even when…

Find a place at the edge of a swamp Listen and learn and take in who goes – who stays – what’s eaten – what decays – all the stinks and stews of it in the percolating ooze of a swamp’s necessities until you realize this isn’t all that life’s about When you come away…

by Ray Ruhlen We have an extended family of crows around us, I have fed them daily after lunch for many years, we get along together, the crows, me, and out black cat, Mr. Squeakers, who I take out for a walk after lunch and in that time throw torn up bread for them, They…

by Ray Ruhlen "A crow stood on the burning deck, eating potatoes by the peck"We have an extended family of crows around us, I have fed them daily after lunch for many years, we get along together, the crows, me, and out black cat, Mr. Squeakers, who I take out for a walk after lunch…

… we’d go tramping off the back road through salal and ferns and huckleberries and hike the dry logged-off ridges crisscrossed with wild strawberries tiny and tasty and gritty with sand We’d stomp down tough blackberry vines raveling over the slash of old bones piles of branches the loggers left We’d reach past bramble thorns…

Dad where have you gone? Did you leap quicksilver into a big run of legendary June Hogs now long lost? Or are you too smart for that? Did you break through the trap of extinction holding to the shadows of that dam in back of my mind—thinking but not showing much?   Once in a…

Among my brothers and sisters we don’t send cards on birthdays, but we always try to make time to call — to talk and listen, even if for only a few minutes. These moments are often forgotten but not the sound and warmth of the voice. It was my birthday in the middle of the…

by John Thompson No words can speak the power of “I AM HERE” For when black thunder cracks on blood-red plains The horseman comes, the storm-chaser of dreams His feathered spear raised high he splits the wind And silences the babbling tongues of men. My words mean nothing, nor is my story told But lived,…

A memoir by Eugene Marckx   Among the dogs in my life one stands out, a Black Labrador mix that came into our family when we weren’t looking for him.  We were looking for a small black Cockapoo that had run away from us, a dog one of my sons had gotten off his paper route. …

Davison has been a part of A Gathering of Men almost from the beginning. He has participated as a story teller, board member, president, facilitator. He's been a mentor to many men over the years. Additonally he's participated in The Noble Journey, sponsored by Counceling Associates, Which helped me explore four primary male archetypes (King,…