Good morning... When we moved into the tiny, Pennsylvania town-of-my-dreams in the third week of June in 2001, our kids were six, four, two, and two weeks old. As God had planned our placement perfectly, my next door neighbor, Betsy, was also nurturing a two year old and a two week old. Betsy and I became fast, deep-seeded [...]
Good morning... I will facilitate our first class this afternoon, kicking off our Fall 2018 semester. God usually coaxes me to teach a random, deep-seeded read, a book that never hopes to be a New York Times bestseller. For some reason it was extra hard to discern God's pick for this particular season. I was drawn to a handful [...]
Good morning... Over the phone, my faraway friend saw into my seasoned soul, reflecting back my deepest truths (see yesterday's post Our Community of Trees). I am settling into a place I never wanted to be planted. God is growing in me a gift, the gift of expressing the invisible things none of fully understand. My trust is growing stronger [...]
Good morning... "Your post reminds me of one of my favorite poems," she wrote after reading yesterday's message, Be Deep-Spirited Friends. ****** “The Friend who Just Stands By,” B. Y. Williams When trouble comes your soul to try, You love the friend who just “stands by.” Perhaps there’s nothing he can do— The thing is strictly up to you; [...]
Good morning... "The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing... not healing, not curing... that is a friend who cares.” This Henri Nouwen quote reminds me of the "Three C" wisdom of the twelve-step program. When [...]
Good morning... To help the family gather pictures for her funeral reception, I went to my friend's condo last week. My heart was overjoyed to see an antique painting of fruit hanging on her bedroom wall. This handprinted original was a gift she had opened from me, by-chance, at our recent “Symbols of the Soul Gift Exchange," a final exchange [...]
Good morning... I wake on the morning of an important funeral, a funeral I am not able to attend. Funny, but it feels somehow fitting for our funky friendship to experience no formal goodbye. Formal is not her way and neither is it mine. We were strangers when she came to my living room for our weekly class. Shuffling [...]
Good morning... "Friendship is one of the greatest gifts a human being can receive," observes Henri Nouwen's morning meditation from 1.7.18. "It is a bond beyond common goals, common interests, or common histories. It is a bond stronger than sexual union can create, deeper than a shared fate can solidify, and even more intimate than the bonds of marriage [...]
Good morning... Waking to frigid temperatures, she playfully texted me after yesterday's post, "Heaven may be better than Hawaii, but I wouldn't mind going to Hawaii now..." (three smiley, sunglassed emoji faces). "Agreed. Do you know Messiah and his family?" I asked because my friend has close ties to our cancer community. "No, I don't," she answered. "I was [...]
Good morning... Walking with my friend, we were stunned to see a dying cardinal lying on the sidewalk. The little creature was slowly moving his bright red head, looking around, blinking his eyes, but his chubby body was stationary, paralyzed on the pavement. When I said, "Oh, let's pick him up and put him in a soft, private place," I [...]
