Delighting in What Remains…

Today is the anniversary of the death of my father-in-law. I am pondering this morning how we felt on this day last year.  His death was bitter, but there was sweetness in his expiration from this realm to the next. And there was and is much joy in the knowledge that he is in heaven, and we will…

That Gnawing Emptiness…

Here we are standing thigh-deep in glittering red and green–or in my case, the glittering white of the season. It’s not going away for a couple more weeks–it will only intensive. Love or loathe it, Christmas celebration is part of the cultural life-cycle that spins our immediate world. Lights, sparkle, candles, scents, ribbons, baking, colors–all of…

Plastic Shine

The Candles and lights of Christmas have been the backdrop for most of my special seasonal memories. Those hours spent at home with family–the smells of cinnamon and spice rising from the oven while cookies bake, wrappping gifts with holiday songs filling the house, and finally ripping into those shiny gifts under the tree on…

Mongolian Mountain Climbing in Slippers

It seems I went to Ulaanbaantar, Mongoila, at 3:10 AM in my slippers. No, I wasn’t dreaming or sleep walking… but I was there. And it is interesting since I have talked a lot in my spiritual journey about going to Mongolia. In fact, my husband and I have a joke about being buried in…

The Conquering Hero Returns

This guy is, well, just way too cute… he comes home–the conquering hero–today from Ethiopia… and he will have so many stories to tell us. I have been dreaming about him at night and thinking about him in the day… I always wanted to marry the professor like Jo did in LIttle Women, and it…

Snakes and the Cosmos

I have a few blogs that I read daily–faithfully–or at least as often as the writers update them. Some of them are so interesting and well written, I can hardly wait for the next edition. In fact, that’s how it is for most of my favorites. You can see them in my blogroll in the…

haiku: proof

proof that God exits– snowflakes, scarlet leaves, sunlight– there is nothing but…

Post-Election Prayer

This is a great post-election prayer. I love this words to the song The Prayer, sung here by Celine Dion an Josh Groban. Somehow in this gloaming hour as we wait and pray to see what tomorrow will bring, these words say it all: …Lead us to a place guide us with your grace give…

No Time to Fish

After the death of Jesus, the disciples went fishing. They had put their hope in Jesus as a political liberator, and it seemed He did not in fact liberate them. The Jewish people strained under Roman rule, and they wanted freedom and change NOW. Their dreams had been dashed, destroyed on the death tree… and…