April 2, 2021 – My friend Cindi, in the words of Dr. Seuss, has been in a “terribly prickly place.” Cindi undergoes intermittent treatments for an incurable cancer. During Cindi’s recent round of chemotherapy, her husband suffered an unexpected health crisis of his own and spent a week in the hospital recovering from emergency surgery. While […]
ROCKWALL, TX – February 3, 2021 — The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple. –Psalm 119:130 Holiday lights long after Christmas can be a sign of procrastination. My own late-hanging porch lights are more intentional—their cheerful glow offsets the gloom of long winter nights. However, a neighbor once asked […]
ROCKWALL, TX – Dec. 22, 2020 – In the days after the latest presidential election, with the outcome still uncertain, folks were wringing their hands. As the week dragged by, a large percentage of the populous drooped like Super Bowl attendees wearing the losing colors. There is more at stake in an election than in […]
ROCKWALL, TX – October 8, 2020 — We sat on the floor hugging our knees to our chest for protection, wide-eyed at the scene before us. Several people with the same ghastly appearance stumbled forward— not in living color but in half-dead black and white. That was my first encounter with zombies, when Mom allowed […]
ROCKWALL, TX – August 24, 2020 — The wheels on the bus go round and round after nearly six months of sheltering in place. Two of my grandchildren – sporting colorful new masks – are hopping aboard. Attending school may well become the most notable event of Fall 2020. To open or not to open? […]
(ROCKWALL, TX – June 22, 2020) My usual Saturday morning phone call to my elderly parents opened with a question I’d never before asked them: “Do you have plenty of toilet paper?” Isolated in the early months of COVID-19, they depended solely on my time-challenged sister’s weekly visit and grocery run. My father answered and eased […]
(ROCKWALL, TX — May 5, 2020) Out for a walk one April morning, I stopped to greet a neighbor from a safe, COVID-19 distance. When I inquired about her well-being during these trying days, she burst into tears. Her daughter, she explained, is a high-school senior—was a high-school senior. Everything is upended in their world. […]
(ROCKWALL, TX – April 5, 2020) My heart beats faster as the clock strikes midnight in the fairy tale movie. Cinderella is running down the castle steps with the awful realization that her beautiful clothing will soon return to rags. I recall two episodes of real panic, and both involved the same child. Our son, at […]
The year 2020 arrived with more than a bang: a US embassy attack followed by ballistic missiles and the resulting loss of a passenger plane. Meanwhile, as Australia battled wildfire, several other countries experienced either earthquakes or volcanic eruptions. Closer to home, we watched a troubling impeachment trial and grieved the death of a beloved […]
He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love. –Song of Solomon 2:4 Heart-shaped chocolate boxes abound for Valentine’s Day, and some can be found even in senior-living communities, though romantic couples are hard to find. But one residential center I have visited was abuzz for months over a pair […]