Breathe in amazing
Welcome to a new year. People have asked about my resolutions. (I tell them I’m still working on last year’s list.) Or, with our precarious world, some ask for advice on navigating it all. (I don’t remember taking a seminary…
Invitation to wake up
Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium is the strangest, most fantastic, most wonderful toy store in the world. The store is run by Mr. Edward Magorium (who claims that he is two-hundred-forty-three years old), assisted by an insecure Molly Mahoney, and a…
Put on love
On my walk this morning, a conversation with the geese. We stand on a hoarfrost landscape, our temperature here just a wee bit above freezing. I’m sporting my stocking hat and scarf, but the geese seemed unfazed.“I have a new…
Let your music spill
Lorraine Hunt Lieberson began her career as an accomplished viola player. While on tour in Europe (in the late 1980s), her viola was stolen. She could have replaced it. As would be imagined, the theft threw her into a state…
The gift of self
A great Rabbi died. He had been revered and loved by his congregation. After his death, it was decided that the Rabbi's son, himself a Rabbi, would take his father's place.This pleased the congregation, for the son would be "just…
Easter in our hearts
In the perfume shop show window was a large jar of freckle salve, and beside the jar was a sign, which read: Do You Suffer From Freckles?"What does the sign say?" asks Pippi Longstocking. She couldn't read very well because…
The stories we carry
“You all irritate me,” I tell the geese. “Well, truth be told, only sometimes.”“That’s an interesting way to start a homily,” one says, without looking up.“Okay. Maybe it’s not you. It’s me,” I tell them. “Truth be told, I’m churning…
Our capacity to care
Life stretches us all. Sometimes to the breaking point.Needing a story (with an infusion of hope), my mind gratefully retreats to an unseasonably cool night at Vashon’s Red Bike Restaurant. It is packed with patrons, for a local fundraiser auctioning…
The power of love
There is a well-known experiment involving a group of ten monkeys, a ladder and bananas suspended from the ceiling. (Yes, this sounds like a joke; only without the Irish priest or the pub.)When the first monkey (headed for the bananas)…
Passion and a soft heart
Brené Brown tells the story of meeting a young woman at a media conference. She is excited to meet the woman (an accountant / jeweler) because she had bought a beautiful pair of earrings from the woman's online store."How long…
