“Is that your son?” I asked pointing to the little guy who had just scored on my grandson’s soccer team. Strangers to one another, we’d been standing side by side echoing with the same groans, cheers, and sideline advice. Although we didn’t know one another, it was obvious that we rooted for the same team. […]
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In August of 2017 an eclipse marked our path in Kansas City, Missouri, where we lived. I wrote about it on a blog then. Today, we live in Virginia, not smack in the center, but still near to the path of totality. April 8, 2024 highlights the same truth as the eclipse of six years […]
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We call them “thorny situations.” They describe something we’d usually rather avoid. Because thorns hurt. Because a situation wrought with barbs and little wiggle room is bound to bring pain. As we contemplate the Easter story, how appropriate for thorns to appear both in the Garden and at the Cross. When the Creator spoke the […]
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“It’s too heavy,” he whined. His little hands strained to lift a fat rough log. He wanted to imitate his grandpa who seemed to hoist them like twigs into a wheelbarrow. The red cheeks of a five-year-old, his desperate grunts, and unhappy face drew my husband over to help. Grandpa carried one end and together […]
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“It needs an update,” my husband says. He wasn’t talking about me, which is a good thing. For us both. Phones, computers, thermostats, security systems, clocks, TV’s, GPS systems. I mean really? Have you noticed how many things need updating? “They aren’t talking,” he sighs, with a kind of long extended tire-flattening sound. […]
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“Eat the green beans first,” I told my homeschooled grandson. He grinned. He understood immediately what I meant. It really had nothing to do with vegetables, but everything to do with the math. Like cold green beans next to delicious hot fried chicken, math remained on my grandson’s plate for as long as he could […]
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His little fingers dripped with orange greasy pizza oil and stuck together with chocolate fudge-vanilla. I checked his face and found it wreathed with those same streaks of orange and black. Quickly I stretched across the table, searching for a napkin to wipe his mess before it migrated to my jacket. But before I found […]
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It broke my heart and stole my resolve. As a writer, rejects come. It’s kind of part of the whole deal, it happens and though difficult, it usually helps me grow. But this email rejection bit like dog’s teeth into the fabric of my being. It wouldn’t let me go. I’d labored hours upon hours, […]
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“Was it Ross?” “No that’s not right,” he shook his head. “Richard?” “Maybe we ought to take some of that stuff they advertise on T.V.,” my husband mused when both of us together couldn’t come up with the name which was “on the tip of our tongues.” “What stuff?” I asked. “Oh, you know those […]
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One of our teenaged granddaughters spent a few days with us recently. She came loaded with gift cards she’d received from Christmas. We spent a day shopping and she had a day of bliss. But even with a store full of a teen’s heart’s desires, the math had to be figured. How much of the […]
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