Lean and leaning,
   top-heavy with a mop
   of madly splaying frond hair,
regally towering above
   and swaying precipitously
   in the slightest tropical breeze
yet holding tenaciously as
   gales blow mighty--
   a miracle of strong...

We were so young.  We didn’t feel young, but I wasn’t quite 22.  We were launching on that big adventure called marriage, forty-eight years ago today.  Our wedding was a small affair in my mother’s home: only David’s immediate family and my extended family...

Every year on this day I remember my Grandma Mary.  Today would be her 128^th birthday.  Some years her birthday falls on Mother’s Day. Not so this year, but the date is still indelibly written on my heart. 

Grandma Mary had one child, my mom.  When my grandfather passed...

Motherhood isn’t always the lovely and rewarding experience described by flowery greeting cards.  I know personally the challenges and even deep sadness that a mother goes through.  I suffered through one child’s learning disabilities and another’s life threatening...

Sing, aged turtle, as you rise
  from the depths of the ocean’s brine;
sing of the world’s primal onset,
  of time and times and half a time.

Sing, tiny seeds dropped in the soil
  amidst the charred remains of trees;
sing of rebirth, of green and spring
  carried along...

haiku for Lori

         Unhinged by wind
like hair falling out in clumps
     advancing new growth

Liz McFadzean

The wonderful thing about our God is that he always had a “work-around” for sin.  His work-around is one perfect atoning sacrifice for my sin and the sin of the world.  

I’m pretty careful these days with the word sin in any instance except in the case of my...

At the beginning of Lent, I distinguished harmony from unison singing.  When I longed for harmony, I wasn’t longing for total agreement, but for a melody of multiple voices in tune with one another.  So here, near the end of Lent, I go back to a similar refrain—I am longing...

Jesus is the one who has broken down the walls of hostility between humans.  I must be oh, so careful not to build them back, through unkind thoughts or broken systems.  So, this week I long for HUMILITY and EMPATHY. 

I’ve put these two words together because both require me...

I used to believe that if I kept to my workout regimen, I wouldn’t ever lose my muscle tone.  I could keep my body and fitness forever.  I didn’t take into account the debilitating effects of plantar fasciitis.  An overuse injury, common to tennis players of a caliber...