I quickly lose interest in puzzles, especially mazes on paper. I get upset at all the choices. Stressed. Flummoxed. Discombobulated. Then I start drawing my way through, crashing blindly into one wrong turn after another. I think I see the way, only to discover I don't. I want off the page. My daughter Maggie approaches…
Have you ever wanted to give up? I mean surrender, with white flag waving, after trying your best and getting nowhere? Smashing into that brick wall and discovering it hasn't shifted a single inch? Plotting and planning a course forward and ending up farther behind? I have. After 3 months of revising a manuscript, I…
We finally moved into a house with a walk-in pantry. Cliff discovered this 1859 historical treasure had a flour bin, not that we planned on hitching up the wagon to fetch 100-pound sacks of the stuff. Just interesting. Our moves always involve a scramble of opening boxes, sometimes accurately labeled. Filling kitchen cabinetry was easy,…
When I assembled the lighted village for 2020, it was the same but different. No carolers, shoppers, Goodwill band, children building snowmen, or Santa. Even the man waiting on the park bench was absent. All were inside, sheltering in place, hoping to survive the pandemic. Like the three of us. Maggie was sent home in…
We all respond to certain sounds. Down the street from us, the village fire station blasts a siren for emergencies. Like it or not, we hear it loud and clear, as volunteers race to their post. Hardly front-line responders ourselves, our hearts beat with concern, nevertheless. Our neighbors Rob and Beth also stand ready, listening.…
I never knew about bucket lists until a movie came out with that title. Whenever people talk about their lists, traveling is usually involved. Exotic. Adventurous. I thought about that. I've been on a Mexican bus stopped at midnight by armed outlaws in the jungle. When they boarded, passengers shouted "Dos Gringos!" and pointed to…
Some people blow out candles and wish. Some people close their eyes and pray. Some people cross their fingers and hope. I watch everywhere, all the time, for three things. They rise up before me--these tiny miracles--tucked into ordinary settings. Had I been looking the other way, I would have missed them. But I wasn't.…
Several years ago, a young woman asked me the secret to a long marriage. As if I were a Wise Woman with a stone tablet. As if I were a Unicorn surrounded by a Truth and Beauty Rainbow. As if there is a secret. But now after 41 years of marriage, I can offer this.…
To pick up where I ended in my last post, it happened a block from our house. Maggie was walking our dog down the sidewalk. A man in a pickup backed down his driveway without paying any attention. Maggie quickly stepped out of the way to let him pass. Her movement must have alerted him…
When I told my mother we were adopting a baby from China, she said, "Honey, are you sure? People say such mean things." Not that I thought she was wrong, but I had no idea what Maggie would face in Whiteville--two white parents with white friends and relatives, living in white neighborhoods, attending mostly white…
