The blip on the horizon which slowly comes into horrifyingly clear view or the sudden flash, annihilation without warning. My father lingered for several days giving his children time. My stepfather was a phone call from the police in the middle of the night. Which? The agony of waiting or finality without farewell?
I cannot save him. I cannot save anyone. I could not save my mother. Or my father. Or my siblings. I have helped people along the way. The neighbor with cancer who needed someone to step in. The students, full of self-doubt, who needed someone to believe in them. The family member with a mental […]
I’m taking time to heal. I’m taking care of my own needs. I’m letting go of the past. I’m learning to love myself. I’m focusing on the future. I’m making sure I get out. I’m leaning on my friends. I’m taking up new hobbies. I’m finding out who I am now. I’m allowing myself to […]
Twenty-four years ago, three months before my mother died, I put my grandmother into a nursing home. It was the one of the two things she never wanted. The other was to have cancer. Instead, it was my mother, her daughter, who would die of it. My grandmother died simply, of old age. After leaving […]
Yesterday was one of my really “bad” days. Sorrow without end. A mental attempt to undo, like the aftermath of a car accident. Why didn’t I take another route? Stop for gas? Postpone the trip? No. No. No. No. No. This can’t be happening. But it is. And the enormity of my loss staggers me. […]
I was nearly to the turning point of my daily walk, the park which marks the end of the trip away and the beginning of the way home, when I realized I had not been paying attention to my surroundings. More mindful now, I stopped to look at a nearby tree. Stripped of its protective […]
You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt has lost its flavor, with what will it be salted? It is then good for nothing, but to be cast out and trodden under the feet of men. There are days when I struggle to maintain a sense of purpose. Of utility. To myself, […]
For this, the third of a series reflecting on a meditation podcast, I set out on my walk with the intention of paying particular attention to discoveries made along my path. Be Here Now. Yesterday’s rain encouraged mushrooms to sprout overnight. In the gravel of my neighbor’s driveway, stood two yellow mushrooms. Caps rounded, the […]
Yesterday it was pouring rain when I left a friend’s house. I got drenched again running from the car to my front door. Once inside, I stripped off wet clothes, lit candles in every room, put on the tea kettle, and ran a hot bath. After a luxurious soak, I tied my bathrobe around my […]
Cooler air this morning heralds not the arrival of fall but its impending arrival. A house undergoing renovation still wears a white-on-white wicker porch swing. Twisted balusters and the siding – with the rounded bottom edge traditional to original houses in this neighborhood – gently flake milk-white paint. Whorls of bare wood, its DNA, peek […]