Living Well

  • Phlox

    Phlox

    I am astounded by phlox.  You know, the tiny little perennial flower that pops up in bright pink, purple, and white this time of year on hillsides and rock walls.  We planted a couple of small bits on our patio around some larger planters four or five years ago and each year it comes back…

  • 2.23

    2.23

    I hadn’t run consistently in a while, but today I ran 2.23 miles in honor of Ahmaud Arbery , the 25-year old man who was shot and killed while running outside Brunswick, Georgia on February 23. As I ran, I thought about what it would be like if this were my last run, my last…

  • Re-form

    Re-form

    I was watching this video last night and was about half-way through when I burst into tears.   It’s a collaboration of over 65 churches and Christian movements in the UK, their music ministers calling down blessings over their country.  And if you watch their faces, you see their connection to the Holy Spirit, their…

  • Quilt

    Quilt

    “What’s that yellow thing behind you?” asked a book club friend on our shared zoom call.  I turned to look behind me at a pair of quilts that are draped over the rocking chair in my bedroom.  Made up of squares from the long-outgrown clothes of my children, these quilts are in the background of…

  • Honey

    Honey

    I’m having a hard time today.  I found I didn’t want to get out of bed and face another day filled with the same stresses, fears, and challenges we’ve been facing for weeks.  I’ve been working hard to find the positive, and as a person of faith, to find the resurrection part of all this…

  • Asparagus

    Asparagus

    I hadn’t bought asparagus in months as I couldn’t bring myself to spend $4/pound, but we all know that with the spring comes the very tasty and also much lower-priced asparagus, so I had planned on waiting it out. Then came a pandemic, and all thoughts of non-utilitarian vegetables moved pretty far down the list. We…

  • Barabbas

    Barabbas

    I was watching a live feed of a Palm Sunday mass yesterday and the internet connection was cutting in and out, making it a little hard to focus on the readings but at one particular choppy bit, one word came flying out at me in a way it hadn’t before. Barabbas. You know him, he’s…

  • Essential

    Essential

    In this time of crisis, we’re being stripped of quite a lot.  Roles, practices, relational habits and interaction, labels, even jobs or our health.  In addition, the way we practice our faith has completely changed.  Within my own church tradition, Catholics are being told we can confess our sins directly to God without a priest…

  • Normal

    Normal

    “I just can’t wait until this is all over and things can go back to normal.” I felt the fatigue and worry in my friend’s voice as she spoke these words, and I feel it, too.  I want to see my preschool music students face-to-face, want to gather with my friends and family.  I want…

  • Real

    Real

    I remember one morning from a few years ago.  It was very early, before the sun was even up, and I was driving my high school daughter to a waiting bus for her Washington DC class trip. I hugged her and watched the bus pull away, and on the way home, saw the sun was…