Essays

Embracing Dingy Socks and the Wider Lesson They Teach

            At the doctor’s office, I was told to undress and get into a gown by the nurse.  As I started to untie my shoes, the nurse said, “Cool shoes!” as she gathered her things to leave....

Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday Are a Perfect Couple

Valentine’s Day is on Ash Wednesday this year.  At first thought, they seem like an unlikely pairing.  Valentine’s Day is a day reminiscent of romance and love.  It’s filled with roses, chocolates, lavish dinners, teddy...

What if New Year’s Resolutions Are a Misinterpreted Yearning to Participate in the Penitential Season Known as Lent?

I am happy to say that my area has had a milder than average winter.  Most of the highs have been near 40 degrees which has afforded me the luxury of continuing my daily run outside instead of being forced to move it to the monotony of my treadmill in our...

Perhaps Sliced Bread Isn’t the Best Thing

            “It’s the best thing since sliced bread.”  I’ve heard this phrase all my life.  It’s always made me think, “Boy, slicing your own bread must have been pretty difficult in order...
Trying to Turn and Become Like Children

Trying to Turn and Become Like Children

Part 1: Forgiveness   I stopped making dinner and followed the sounds of screaming into the living room where I came upon yet another knock-down drag-out fight between my two youngest who had, apparently, engaged prison rules.  There was some question...

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A Not-So-Great Defense of King David

A Not-So-Great Defense of King David

I recently read through a discussion on social media about King David.  The argument being made was the very notion that the church would hold King David in any kind of esteem proved just how anti-woman and patriarchal the church is.  He used his...

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A Monarch Infestation

A Monarch Infestation

In the course of busy, we were interrupted by unexpected visitors. At the most, we tend to only find three or four Monarch caterpillars on our milkweed. This year, there were close to twenty. And a month early, to boot! They ate all but four branches of my milkweed...

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Becoming a Haiku

Becoming a Haiku

Even as a child, I was fascinated with the concept of Haiku poetry.  It seemed madness to me to take something as free-flowing and abandoned as writing from the heart and applying such Draconian restrictions to it as 5 syllables followed by 7 syllables and...

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It’s Nice to be Back

It’s Nice to be Back

I won’t go into all the reasons as to why I’d stayed away.  Suffice it to say, the Church had always been my sanctuary from the world and then, last year, the world invaded my sanctuary.  And so, befuddled and incensed, I stayed away....

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God Designed the Foot, but Can He Be Trusted?

God Designed the Foot, but Can He Be Trusted?

It is sometimes in the unexpected minutiae that we are surprised, once again, by the fact that God’s design works just fine without any human tinkering.  I kept planning to start running again, but various obstacles kept coming up.  Proving forever true the...

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