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  • Character

    When we were young, our mother would gather me and my sisters on Good Friday to read the story of the Passion. Wearing pajamas and carrying mugs of tea, we sat from noon to three, for once not rebelling against her wishes. She told us that every aspect of humanity could be found in that…

  • Christmas, Death, Birth

    On November 4, 2012, my family celebrated one last Christmas with our Mom. She died the next day. The day that followed that was my forty-first birthday. On that birthday/funeral planning morning, as Facebook greetings poured in on top of condolences, one sweet friend wrote that she hoped I would one day find some meaning…

  • Silver

    the little place in me where God lives is pure silver, shining and gleaming and everything that comes from that place is pure, shining, gleaming and good I watch it as it goes out music, words, interactions, in utter amazement it is a part of me, apart from me it is the place where God…

  • Soul

      I was crossing the line from sleep to waking and was already making lists in my head. Post office, laundry, papers, mess, dishes…things I needed to get done to make way for the things I wanted to do, like meet an old friend for lunch. Before I even got out of bed, I felt…

  • Cardinal

    My spiritual advisor has got me journaling, which is basically a process in which you ask a question and then freeform write out answers. You write without judgment and in my case, without stopping, and when you’re done, you look back over what you’ve written and some of it may be from God Himself, using…

  • Love

    Valentine’s Day is a hard day for a lot of people. I have friends who are still searching for a partner, friends whose marriages are in trouble, friends who are divorcing or divorced, friends whose spouses are in Heaven. For them, this is a day in which they are bombarded with images of romantic love,…

  • Rules

    I went grocery shopping at the worst possible time. It was Saturday, and the day before the Super Bowl, and it was as crowded as you might imagine, but I thought I could get in and out with my short list. I was wrong. The aisles were crammed full of people and carts and the…

  • 11:04

    I know lots of people who see significant numbers everywhere they look….on clocks, receipts, in line at the grocery store. 11:11 is a common one, and when you happen to catch it, it’s supposed to be a little hello from someone you love who has died. My sister sees her birthday numbers, 3.16, as a…

  • Work

    I have been sick for about a month with an upper respiratory illness that has affected how I hear, sing, and breathe, and it’s been hard to do those things in my work as a preschool music teacher, but mostly, I’ve managed. Yesterday, I had to call in sick for the first time in forever,…

  • Obituary

    My Dad and his brother Franny are part of a generation, or maybe just a neighborhood, that is all about honor. Doing the right thing when no one is watching and paying respect are lost arts these days, but it’s part of how they grew up in South Boston in the 1950s and ’60s. It’s…