Thom Forbes

If I weren't so absent-minded, I probably would have made a good absent-minded professor. It's not that I would not have completed my dissertation like so many others. I would not have figured out what field it should be in in the first place (although quite a few would have been eliminated by natural selection).

But I digress. Which is the point.

My thoughts tend to wander; My attention is easily nabbed; I am frequently accused by my family of leaving "ummms" in the air; and many a story I…

Deirdre had a moving letter about a young soldier's suicide published in the Journal News yesterday. Here it is for when the link disappears behind a pay-only archive:

U.S. soldier's death strikes a chord

Sometimes I turn the page in the newspaper without reading past the headline. But today, something compelled me to read about Army Pvt. Keiffer Wilhelm, 19, of Plymouth, Ohio. Maybe his unusual name intrigued me. Maybe it was his age, a year younger than my only son, who I just watched play…