“In holy ways there is never so much must.” – Thomas Merton Holy ways are a mystery. But must, I know about must. Ohh the Obligation. Demand. Compulsion. Ought to. Should do. HAVE to. FINE! I must do the ironing. Surely, Thomas, there is some value in forcing the will to iron out the waves and wrinkles, in making all things ... read more
Numbers
Jack Gordon calls it “free” because that’s how old he is. More than two but less than four. Numbers have always been something of an anathema to me, if only because they are so non-visual—five what? Seventeen what? And once I know what, I am so much more interested in that. 58 sparrows in a bush (but you can only see 14). How many are ... read more
The Unknown
There are two types of knowing. First, things I know that I don’t know: how to say plum blossom in Chinese or how to make notes drop like pearls from the piano, or why my mama died of ovarian cancer. These are more like limitations. Ignorance acknowledged. Then there are the things that I don’t know that I don’t know. Unknown unknowns. ... read more
Molecules Bump
My husband tells me how molecules bump together. That rock I toss in the lake shoves out a ripple that doesn’t stop when it reaches land. Bump against nudge, it continues through the densest bedrock. Around the whole world it goes, eventually arriving back smaller but persistent like ... read more
Bending Water
Water bends over the edge toward the next thing in its path, the way my man gets on a plane and flies to Boise. Absence: a kind of free fall. No longer able to hold tight, to touch lips, time and space fill the days and nights. An interjection of sky between us takes the watery way our lives flow together and turns ... read more
Impossible Nothing
Jesus had just been asked by the disciples why they couldn't cast out a demon.He tells them ..."because of your little faith...if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move and nothing will be impossible for you."Nothing will be impossible for you.I've always imagined that ... read more
Cheeto Fingers
Someone gives you some Cheetos. Soon that salty orange reside covers your hand. When my children were small someone prophesied over me saying that one of my children will be a preacher. I licked that salty residue off my fingers for years, now and then sticking my fingers back in my bag of memories and testing the truth of what was given me.My sons ... read more
Looking At the Sun
How do you explain sudden healing? It was a mere sermon illustration, a picture of Michelangelo's sculpture of David in all his nakedness.Without warning a long held hurt—something about how the church views art and how the church treats artists—falls away. Not just OK, no more worries. A ragged wound miraculously smooth, as if it had been a stone ... read more
Time Change
Time is change, nothing else.Time is the endless possibility of changeand the crushing inability to remain the same. Licking that Popsicle changesa summer day. Changing the mindis less visible, but moremonumental, shall we sayeternal? Lasting change,what is that? Goddoes not change because God is outside of time.When belief and time vanishwill the ... read more
Choices
Beige gloves, and turquoise scrubs, she carries a generic spray bottle marked with a Sharpie: rubbing alcohol. The syringe contains an inch and a half of gem tone blue-green liquid. We are told there is a vein on the inside of the back leg she can sometimes find without shaving. No more than five pounds, the cat is easily pushed on her side. A ... read more
Soweto Slum
Soweto Slum in Nairobi Kenya.Some noted differences: American poverty involves more stuff, albeit perhaps, broken, useless, cheap trappings. Litter of old sofas, hulks of defunct cars, not so much garbage, no open sewers. Soweto is not cluttered with the discarded. Garbage and sewage excepting.Three closets the size of home. We poke our paleness ... read more
Flying
We take flying for granted. A magical act suspended in the steely strength of physics. Oh, that it could be without steel and combustion. Except then it would depend on me, wouldn't it? Think of the exhaustion of those poor birds migrating from North to South America. Or London and Ireland. With my sister and neices and other school mates and ... read more
