Roy’ Sunday Letter for August 16, 2026
Change Has Changed & Will Continue To Change
The first workshop I attended on “The Nature of Change ” was in the early 1980’s. Although, I knew something different and important was happening, I was slow to grasp the pace and impact of Change. I first thought of Change in Stages…Adjust to one Stage, then the next. That was Not to be. Change became chaotic with multiple events and adjustments. Altogether, I learned to expect there will always be more changes on the way. Yes, Change changed me, connections to others and my world, all of us. Thes are changes that came to mind this week as I wait for the 100+ degree weather to change.
My sense of Neighborhood has Changed. New neighbors are younger, perhaps raised in a town house or apartment without the shared experience of my youth. I have slowly adjusted to the lack of interest in “being neighbors.” Beth and I have walked the block, made bread and left notes. New move-ins prefer living singular lives. I had not paid attention to the how and when of this Change.
We have friends, most older, who prefer the feel of a Print book, turning pages, following the story line. Younger friends read and follow the story line as an Audio book or downloaded words and pages on their phone. I published my initial collection of 32 stories in 2022. Today I have 70+ new writings with no best approach to publish, bundle, or right path to readers and those who appreciate my craft. While I was editing the world of writing Changed.
Beth is an artist. Brushes, tubes of paints, pens, and the right paper or canvas finding closets and cabinets wherever we have called home. I first noticed artist in Santa Fe turning more to their iPad or Laptop for their colors and creations than brush and canvas. Art shows organizers had to not only consider the quality of a submitted art, but also in what ways the art was created.
I had earned to be patience waiting for a voice to come on the 1- 800 line. These human voices gave me information and solved my presenting problem through their experience and instruction manuals. Today’s voice is more likely to be AI generated, show interest in my problem, and express a desire to make my day better. The voice now wait for has Changed.
The practice, expression, and understanding of our individual Faith has Changed. Rather than encouraging the deepening of Faith, there are state and national leaders who seek to limit, to Change where and how we experience out Faith practice. I gain through the heritage of Faith and at the same time discover meaningful ways to serve others through my Faith. Both the unchanging and always changing, both true, living parts of my Faith.
There are more paragraphs of Change known to us all. Trevel – Music – Health & Wellness – Foods & Markets – Our Shrinking Circle of Friends – and the Angels of Care who come to us, to comfort, to take a chair beside ours in the waiting rooms of our lives.
Consider the ways you have Changed, along with the events and experiences of your life and the lives of your family. I absorb, resist, and accept the Changes of today, and plan for and prepare for the Changes to come.
Roy, both a creator and receiver of Change
Through all my health issues I have noticed a huge change in personal care. When I was a child we had a family physician who took care of everything. He knew all our history and reacted quickly to any issue. Today there is a specialist for everything. After several months I am finally meeting with this surgeon that can perform the procedure I need. Are we meeting in person, nope we have a Zoom meeting scheduled. I have to take my own blood pressure, temperature and give them my weight. I have already received a bill for this call! What has happened to care in the United States, this is obviously a change I abhor but it is the wave of the future. I want to go back to Dr. Myers who sat with me and held my hand before they removed my tonsils. I am trying to decide if all these changes are good, at my age I doubt it.
Your clear wording of medical care will be a message for all of us, and we two also.
Setting aside the barriers to personal care we want to know, be near you on next steps.
Your next steps also include September and a long awaited next you.
Wow….& thank you for open heart writing.RB
Roy, thank you again for brightening up my Sunday morning! As I advance down the path of life I experience the changes of life and culture. The doctor no longer comes to our homes to provide medical care. My doctor has left his professional path of doctoring due to the Wall Street take over of health care. A huge loss for me and an unexpected change for him. I have been very fortunate to help craft my present path with you and Beth and others in ways that are most positive in a world of apparent confusion. There is active hope, healing, and the finding of new positive directions to direct my new energies. We have Buddists in our midst, a possible birthing of the realization of the importance of the history of the Native American Culture and perhaps a healing presence of healing in our present culture of humaity. There is much healing to embrace.
Your thinking and writing are examples of healing and health.
We read your slow mail letter together. Soon we 3 will join again…..and that is good.
Hi Roy. I enjoyed your article. Lots of changes in life and living since the days of our youth! My life changed markedly when I had my motorcycle accident in 2018. The mTBI – as one lawyer wrote, there is nothing “mild” about it – left me with persistent post concussion syndrome and vestibular hyperacusis which will likely be lifelong and a somewhat changed personality. That is the most interesting change for me. I’m still me, but I also know I am a bit different. Such is life. Best wishes to you and Beth!
Roy – Don’t you remember the old adage of: “The only thing constant is change”. Advances, such as in technology, the end of our agrarian lifestyle and the change in climate that we are experiencing need to give way to how people live. My father came off the farm to drive truck in what would now be considered a mechanized wagon, and we now see trucks as big as most houses we grew up in, grossing out at 80,000 pounds. My grandparents, being “middle class” had a telephone on the wall, through which you called the operator, and they contacted the party. Now we have the computer in our pocket which can call any number in the world (without human assistance).
Yes, I remember the Physicians who would sit with you and attend you at your domicile. However, as we know, it is only in the last 75 years (rough guess) that Doctors have been more helpful than harmful. I can personally recount a couple of botched medical issues of the past and now, the botched issues in a particular hospital are held to one or two per year. Yes, at 86+, I am living proof of the strength of genes and also the advancements of medicine.
All change is not bad, and I too am capable of sounding like my grandmother who often said: “The world is going to Hell”.