Letter to my home on the importance of children

[Draft One, 12 March 2015] Did you know that before you were here, another structure inhabited the land? In the first Act of this land’s existence, there was a deep, varied garden, filled with nut trees and timber trees, with berries, with vines and flowers, and with creatures that depended on them all. Then silence […]


Thirteen years…

Almost fourteen years ago now, the house was placed in the yard (September 1999). I planted trees in front and on the sides the following Spring. Flower beds in front the year after that, if I remember correctly. And gradually the yard and the home took shape. A few years into the process, I started […]


Today, not in the garden

It has been a while again since I posted, but last night I wanted to share something with friends on a social media site and browsed through the pictures I posted here last summer. How things have changed. Hope, sadness; light, shadows; growth, decline; laughter, sighs. I have been waking earlier than my normal the […]


November Notes

I don’t have a lot of energy to write at the moment. I taught six consecutive school days in a high school classroom, which was a lot of fun, but tiring. Different type of environment, and I spent a lot of energy helping the kids stay on task. And then, of course, I caught the […]


Dads and other real heros

I get tired of the hyperbole so common in the media today, particularly when it comes to their descriptions of sports stars, actors and others in popular news. I have heard too often a high-scoring player referred to as a “hero.” And then they need to up the ante when they are faced with someone […]


Poem a Day April 7, 2012

Mitochondria (suggested by Krista) subtle organelles power-generators of true nuclear energy L’Engle wrote long ago in time a wrinkle: the difference between what-is-known and what-is-not-yet-known compared to what-is-no-longer-known the greatest danger in science is unknowing and not caring when knowledge is lost meanwhile minute mitochondria make music and we whistle while we work I first […]


Occupy the New Year: A Challenge

This is a good time to dedicate ourselves to making the world a better place. Rather than focusing on self-centered goals at this time for resolutions (lose weight, clean out the garage, exercise more), why not choose one specific project that will help many people? For example, this is an election year. If you are […]


Life, Love, Loss and Learning

Feeling a little or a lot sentimental this evening, I am thinking about what it’s all about. If life isn’t about (and for) doing good, even great, things, then I am barking up the wrong tree. So, what is great, or even good? Does it mean becoming someone like Steve Jobs? He was apparently so […]


Not the end of the world

Nothing that has been upsetting or bothersome to me the last few years seems to be all that important, in the aftermath of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami this last week. I am so sad. I did contribute to the international Red Cross in the wake of the New Zealand earthquake. And I have contributed […]


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