I read a post on the 'gram about "Emodiversity." I think the full article was written by David Brooks for The Atlantic. I don’t have a subscription and so I am floating on the blurb under the graphics, perhaps an irresponsible handling of the subject matter. Nonetheless, the notion intrigued me and I wanted to put a pin in it for my own self assessment and reflection. The idea that we can experience more than one…
I wrote the eulogy for my mom’s funeral. It was the last big piece I have written since my mom died in July. I am not physically arrested or immobilized by grief. I am very much able to carry on the daily tasks of life, but my creative energy is bone dry. I stepped away from writing for a while because I couldn’t make the the words take shape. I worried that, in the refining process…
I used to be a decisive long-range planner. In college I had a beautiful color-coded calendar. At the beginning of each semester I would spend a whole afternoon dutifully transferring my syllabi to this master calendar. This same detailed planning seeped into the early days of my teaching career. I had binders and page protectors and labels and desk calendars with everything predictably planned out. I lived on routines. I tried desperately to execute life devoid…
I met up with two friends at a local brewery last week. I joined the spontaneous gathering wearing sweats and a sweatshirt -- evidence that this was an unusual way for me to break the monotony of a week splitting at the seams. I ordered my favorite beverage from their drink menu: bourbon peach iced tea. The spring sun was dipping into the lower half of the sky and the cool air settled on the patio…
I remember telling people after Addy's first month of cancer treatment that she was in remission. To most people remission sounds like a magical reversal from sick back to healthy. You had cancer. You are now in remission. Everything is fine. But remission is an early step in a progression that can last a very long time. It is not an end result. It divides terminal from treatable, not healthy from sick. It may even define…
We took a vacation. Nothing major, but we had to get away. We did it in the safest way we could figure. We took our camping trailer and headed to the Oregon Coast. We brought our own food to reduce the need to interact with people indoors once we got to our destination. We spent a lot of time playing on the beach and hiking. It was vacation hermit-crab-style. We did one indoor thing; we watched…
I taught Sunday School to 4th - 6th grade this past Sunday. It was Palm Sunday and our lesson was about the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem (Mark 11:1-11). I read the lesson Saturday evening in preparation and I was nodding my head as I read. There was the whole part about the donkey being the transportation of a peace-time King and it was a prophesy from Zechariah 9:9 the crowd would have been familiar…
I am outsider, not a ne'er-do-well or a misfit, just someone who has found contentment on the outer edge. I can trace the heritage of this feeling to a convergence of experiences. I moved 3,000 miles -- from an enormous city to a small hamlet filled with people revered for never leaving -- all while 'coming of age.' It felt entirely disastrous. ____________________________ My parents laced their way from Orlando to Spokane through swamps, deserts, plains,…
We took our little blue FJ-40 to church yesterday. It's our "once-in-a-while" vehicle, the special occasion car. On this day, the occasion was the feeling in our bones that winter is nearing its end. The early signs of spring are flitting around everywhere. I have heard the birds in the branches chittering away all week. My Allium has sent its first shoots up through the bark. The sun is getting warmer and the air is fragrant.…
I turned forty in August 2020. This midlife milestone caused a bit of a riptide of self-evaluation. The natural season of personal investigation was paired with the rare living conditions dictated by a global pandemic. The months leading up to my birthday were spent in Covid lockdowns confined to the house with my four children who were supposed to be distance learning. My husband, a school superintendent, was considered essential and spent 3 months in his…