Okay, Gillette does a commercial which chastises men for bad behavior, a shadow of the “#MeToo” movement. Some men react, “I don’t need Gillette to lecture me on masculinity.” Many men are not used to being called to task. They are used to being dominant and in control, not necessarily of themselves. Call them on their stuff, and it pisses them off because no one is supposed to call them on their stuff, not even another man. The term “Toxic Masculinity” gets tossed around, bu

I labored over whether to write this for a couple of months. I wasn’t quite sure exactly what I wanted to say, or in the final edit, that I have said everything that I needed to say. Some of the things I have said reveal more of me than even some of my closest personal friends have known. I struggled over whether to write this at all. I struggled over how much I might reveal, and how I have felt about revealing these things, at this point, to everyone. However, like many, I a

WHITE FEAR I first wrote this in 2017, this is an updated version of the previous blog post. I was raised in the 1960s on a farm about ten miles out of a north Arkansas town, and the town was less than two thousand in population. Any town larger was about 40 minutes away, and that town had a population of about six to eight thousand at the time. The region was rural, scrub farmland with more trees and rocks than pasture, and it was almost totally white in

By Karlyle Tomms She eloped across the county line at fourteen, lied about her age, and married a man almost twice her age. He probably...

On the day my father died, I found a black feather on my way back from lunch standing straight up in the grass as though it had been...

Moments of Peace Karlyle Tomms 7/30/16 Pinnacle Mountain stands alone along the Arkansas...

I grew up with guns. My grandpa had rifles and shotguns hanging on the walls. They were propped on ten penny nails driven just far enough...

Three words came to mind the first time I saw her –weird, strange, and goofy. She was older than the rest of us. She had a minimum of...

The eastern Ozarks of Arkansas are not quite as grand as those to the west. Here the Ozark Mountains begin to roll gradually into the...

I understand hate. I have felt rage so intense that it incites to kill. I have felt seething, malignant resentment so extreme that it...

(NOTE: I have been surprised by the number of people (All white people so far) who have completely missed the point of this essay. This...

Yesterday my aunt was laid to rest. Cold Arkansas wind sawed at our ears as we stood beside the grave site, an omen of snow later to...

Let’s get this straight. The entire human race is crazy. Every single one of us is insane right down to the very last one. There are just varying degrees of crazy ranging from Charles Manson or Hitler at one end, to the Dali Lama or the Pope at the other end. Most of us ramble about somewhere in the middle. Sometimes we get it right, but sometimes wrong. Nobody—not even the Dali Lama or the Pope—gets it all right all the time. So, before we go any further, cut yourself some

A glass of wine, a magazine and the porch swing in warm weather, back against a pillow, wind chimes and hummingbirds. This is my...

New Year—new beginnings. Everyone thinks about this transition every year as one year rolls over into the other. Goals and resolutions...

When I think of the events occurring on August 9, 2014 in Ferguson Missouri, I am struck by the realization that it only takes a single spark to ignite a firestorm. Yet, it is impossible for such a storm to be ignited without the proper conditions for it to occur. If the forest catches fire it is first likely that it has become dry and tender. A spark upon a moist and nourished landscape is likely to affect little. Lightening can strike the nourished land, and still not igni