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We can take criticism and welcome debate. We welcome commentary but offer the following caveat: if you must be obscene or personally insulting you have a spot reserved in the Spam filter and a serious willingness to corporally express our displeasure should we ever meet. (Read the resume’ and decide accordingly.)

About Us

It’s with Fitzgerald’s words kept as a guiding light we welcome you to Thanks For Listening. We think it to be one of the best websites of its type. The title comes from the sign-off to the award winning column in the Westside Journal in Port Allen, Louisiana.

“Communication is more than people ‘sending and receiving information’ while speaking is at each other. It’s making thought live, grow, prosper and then become something everybody can hopefully resolve a problem with.”

Each column is initiated with this kind of message, whether it’s with the poignancy of the Christmas message: The Little Star” or noting the interaction of a father and son as the father slips away into the shadow world of Alzheimer’s disease. The award winning “Gardens of Stone” warned of the dismal flourishing of military funeral rites at the outset of military operations and the first casualties sacrificed post 9/11. The writing is both powerful and effective, presenting points to ponder and answers to be demanded.

“Communication is people relating to socially, interacting as equals, each adding an element to the ‘sauce piquant’ of community. Without communication we’re another herd moving toward sterile domestication or extinction as a race.” We look at people, placing elements of their personhood in the spotlight for their neighbors to admire or possibly view with a more jaundiced eye. We’re not afraid to tackle the tough issues of the day whether they’re on the national, regional or local level.

Our honest and sometimes controversial approach to analyzing issues is garnered from years of stepping to the frontlines to better assess and confront problems. We try to exhibit “strong, solid writing” (Louisiana Press Association) but with a sense of poignancy but never shying away from the irreverence punctuating the depth of our readers’ (and our) life experiences. We try to get straight to the point. Based in small town America, communication’s energy spreads to cities and villages alike; “we’re neighbors, whether we’re talking across the alley separating New England tenements, like I did as a child, or from a rocking chair at the cracker barrel in the general store, it’s us, being us and trying to make sense of it all.”