November 4, 2020 – Writing Above The Clouds

Rob Jewell

I’m Rob Jewell and I live and write in Woodland Park, Colorado, the City Above the Clouds. I've been fortunate. I worked for 29 years at BFGoodrich in Akron, Ohio. I started editing employee publications and ended as vice president of corporate communications. Then I started a public relations consulting company before becoming a full-time faculty member in the School of Journalism at Kent State University. I taught courses in writing, public relations and mass communication ethics. And I supervised a student-run public relations firm, called Flash Communications. During my tenure at Kent State I was honored to receive the university’s Outstanding Teaching Award. During most of this time I've been a dedicated runner. OK, jogger, if you take speed into consideration. But while my times are not much to write about, I was and am committed. For almost 30 years I ran at least 1,000 miles each year. (Except for one year when I tore my calf muscle playing tennis. So much for tennis.) Being on the road most mornings at 5 a.m. gave me some time to think. It also led to some amazing friendships that now span more than three decades. And my longtime love affair with running helped me shape my first novel, Then We Ran, which is available wherever electronic books are sold. And just so you don't think that all I did was work and run, I have other interests as well, many centering on family. My wife, Mary, was a successful and highly regarded career teacher in the Akron public schools. She now devotes her time and energy to a host of social and athletic activities in Woodland Park. My son, Brian, teaches at Cheyenne Mountain High School in Colorado Springs where he is also the head soccer coach. And my daughter, Jessica, has completed her doctorate at Kent State University where she is also an administrator with the Wick Poetry Center. I've done a lot of writing during my career -- but Jessica is the real writer in the family. I'll try not to make too many errors in this blog. I'm sure she'll be watching.

View Full Profile →

The Soul Of America

Joe Biden said this election was about the soul of America. If that were true, then it appears this morning (November 4) that America is struggling to find its soul.

I’ll admit that I was pretty confident that Biden would win, perhaps in a landslide. After all, I can read the polls just like any of the talking heads on MSNBC and elsewhere.

So this morning, the best we can hope for is that Biden will score a razor thin victory IF all of the mail in votes are allowed to be counted in several of the so-called battleground states. And IF that happens, we can be thankful that millions of Americans took the advice to vote early and vote by mail.

Still, if this was a referendum on Trump, then it will be hard for the Dems to claim any kind of substantial victory. The Senate, most likely, will remain in the hands of the Republicans, making Moscow Mitch once again one of the most dangerous men in the country.

And the GOP is clearly still in bed with Trump.

I don’t know. I just don’t get it.

But regardless of the final result of the election, I do know this: