Insights & Guidance for Planning Ahead

My wife and I have two dogs and a neighbor dog who hangs around quite a bit. Each day either my wife or I or both of us take the dogs for a walk, once in the morning and once in the evening. Generally, when we go on vacation, we try to take them with us. The oldest of the dogs, Kiah, has been with us about 10 years, though she's probably 12 or 13 years old. We "inherited" her from my youngest son. When we first started doing our walks with the dogs, Kiah was young. We h

While my law practice of 40 plus years has always included estate planning, it was only the last seventeen years that my sole focus has been in this area, especially devoted with working with those with a chronic illness or aging issues. I was blessed with the opportunity to care for my grandmother for over ten years, and those years really highlighted the importance of planning and having instructions for our families to carry out those plans. It is important that you make d

Recently we celebrated Father's Day. This year, my youngest son, Dan, and I spent it together in Colorado – just the two of us. We were able to talk: me as a father of grown sons; and him the father of two small boys. But we also did a lot of talking about our roles. Not only did we talk a lot about our roles as fathers, but also our observation as sons. I usually get up early in the morning and do my reading and writing. On Father's Day I recalled both of my fathers: my natu

“Betty” called my office in 2011. She was trying hard to care for her husband who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. We spent some time on the phone trying to find out more about her circumstances. We could tell that she needed some immediate planning done. An appointment was scheduled. A few days later, Betty cancelled the appointment, telling us that she was not ready to take action. Providing long term care is a balancing act. It involves personal time, family dynamics,

Recently I saw a “poll” on Facebook that asked, “What special thing did your mom cook that makes you think of her?” Though I did not respond, it did make me think. I thought about all of the special dishes my grandmother would make, and how many of those were passed on to my mom: pecan pie, macaroni and cheese, chocolate cake, fried chicken, and biscuits. They were all great special dishes, but then I realized that the one dish that will always remind me of my grandmother was

We have lived in our house for over 20 years. When we moved in my three sons were 15, 13, and 11. The neighbors across the street have a very large front yard. It did not take long before that yard was a football, basketball, or whatever else field for the Clinkscales boys. They would get a game going with each other, and soon friends would join in. We have all grown older. The boys’ lives have taken them to different locations through different events of life, some good, an

When I moved by grandmother from Ft. Worth, Texas, to Hays into an assisted living facility, I discovered she was on fourteen different medications. Working with a care coordinator from my office, and my grandmother’s new doctor, we reduced my grandmother’s medication to four! Today, I want to share with you an article written by a care coordinator (Aimee Kroeger) from my office. Have you ever looked at your medications and thought to yourself, “Wow, I take a lot of pills.” o

Happy Holidays to all of you! What a year this has been. One of the things that we are all going to remember about 2020 (and going into 2021) are the pros and cons of wearing masks. As I was sitting down getting ready to write this newsletter, and a couple other newsletters, I had an interesting idea. What are the advantages of wearing a mask? I posed the question to my staff and I got a lot of replies. Let me share with you some of these “benefits”. 1. You keep others safe.

Recently my wife and I ventured to Wichita so that we could spend some time with our two grandchildren. Max is new to the being a grandchild scene, having only been born in May. Alex, on the other hand, is three and really has this “being a grandson” role down to an art. He is also growing up and is being potty trained. That means he wears “big boy” underwear (but still is wearing pants that are roomy enough for Pull Ups – kind of like a diaper). On this particular day, Alex

A couple of years ago, I wrote an article about all of the efforts that my family went through for holiday visits. My grandparents lived hundreds of miles away, but every year we made a grand effort to go to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with them. It was a great effort on the part of my parents. There were times when we fought blizzards; when we were too busy, making the miles seemed difficult; and then as we grew older and schedules proved more difficult, we still powere