ROCKWALL, TX – April 15, 2022 — A woman who approached our dinner table shocked our small church group. Someone asked her, “How much weight did you lose?” “Fifty pounds,” the woman replied with no enthusiasm. This poor soul had suffered the harsh effects of a deadly superbug. Her cure was harsh as well: high-power […]
ROCKWALL, TX (Dec. 15, 2021) The girls’ faces fell an inch apiece after opening their mutual birthday present. Our small audience of parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles had expected a more enthusiastic response. While the eight-year-old dutifully recovered in time to produce a polite smile and a “thank you,” her six-year-old sister summoned the courage […]
ROCKWALL, TX (Nov. 15, 2021) Some memories stand out within the annals of holidays past—for better or worse reasons. I recall my first Thanksgiving holiday away from home due to threatening weather. My college friend and housemate, Rhonda, could not drive the distance to join her family either, so we hatched a plan for our […]
ROCKWALL, TX (Oct. 18, 2021) I once stood face to face with the devil, and I didn’t like the looks of him. I suspected the figure in red was really the boy down the street. He only demanded candy, yet a slight shiver ran down my juvenile spine at the sight of his pointed tail […]
ROCKWALL/HEATH, TX (August 22, 2021) A lot of students take their educational opportunities seriously. Since I was not one of those, I’ve spent a lifetime making up for my losses. A world atlas catches my attention as I pass a certain bookshelf. I throw it open to survey the Caspian Sea. Ten minutes later, I realize […]
ROCKWALL/HEATH, TX (June 24, 2021) The azalea bushes reached their peak of bloom the week a realtor planted her “For Sale” sign in our yard. The house shouted “ready” too since we’d spent weeks preparing for our move to another home only miles away. Perfect timing—we thought. After driving boxes of kitchen items to the […]
ROCKWALL/HEATH, TX (May 6, 2021) Saturday mornings were the worst. My usual routine of dusting each room and dry-mopping the floors grew tedious in the weeks after losing my mother. For over a decade I’d held a phone in one hand and cleaning items in the other while my weekly conversation with Mom made the Saturday […]
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 […]