Today is the last day of 2019, my final blog piece for the year, and I have been unsuccessful in coming up with a good concluding story. Makes me feel a bit down and I’m not sure what to do about it, but I can’t let today go by without posting .  .  . so … Continue reading The End →

‘Mindfulness’ is kind of a buzzword these days. It is a technique for slowing down, being in the present moment, paying attention to what is going on inside and around you. Last month I tripped while hiking and fell hard, straight forward onto my hands, slamming my chest and forehead. Nothing was broken but my ribcage … Continue reading A Mindful Christmas →

It was an extra-heavy trash bag, due to the many notebooks I threw away, the journals of my three years in Ethiopia. I had perused them, retrieved some bits, and all the rest was thrown away, and I am relieved. Page after page in those notebooks recorded irritation, grumbling, criticism, and demands.  Kinda sickening. Why … Continue reading God Most Patient →

I am so glad that my dad had the idea some years back and asked me to do it --  to record my mother’s stories. It was a wonderful task, spending time with Mom and organizing some 40 stories into a beautiful blue book titled “Counting It All Joy.” It is one of the treasures … Continue reading “Counting It All Joy” →

I love Thanksgiving.  I love the focus on special foods, friends, and family and I love thinking back on Thanksgivings Past. I’ve enjoyed various Thanksgivings in Texas, Montreat (I love the traditional morning gathering at church and taking an afternoon walk), Bolivia (letting the kids play hooky from school so we could keep our traditions), … Continue reading My Dubai Thanksgiving →

I only needed margarine that day. As my little daughter and I walked into the grocery store, we both saw him: a raggedy-patched man, sitting on the cold sidewalk, leaning against the brick wall. My four-year-old could not read words but she was good at reading faces.  “Mommy, why is that man sitting there?” When … Continue reading Cookies and Harriet →

I wrote the following 20 years ago, but it is still true.   April, 1998 We have just returned from our spring break vacation in Florida, but it was not a fun holiday for me. The first weekend we visited Jake’s dad in the Grand Court Nursing Home. The second part we spent in my … Continue reading Longings and Love →