FAT
All over the world, people are getting fat today. Because today is Fat Tuesday, the day before Lent begins our forty day march to the cross of Christ and we mark tomorrow with ashes. Different cultures were busy baking their sweet tradition yesterday, making them ready for eating today. The delicious, jelly-filled dough balls covered […]
Our Best Blessing
Thanks. Giving thanks. Giving thanks to God. For what? I’ve been thinking about the what lately. What am I thankful for, really? Well, I could list a thousand things like colored leaves and blue skies and health and horses and actually, I do make a practice of counting my blessings. But I’ve been thinking bigger […]
Moving Movies and the First Snow
Some movies move us. Last night, our family watched an extraordinary documentary listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the largest film screening in history. On August 11, 2012, in Milwaukee’s Miller Park Stadium, 28,442 people gathered to see Honor Flight—The Movie. They also came to honor the last of a dying generation—dying […]
Blessing of Beauty
My dad’s and my relationship is an example of how, with God, all things are possible. We’ve had a rather rough and sometimes downright distant relationship through the decades for numerous reasons. But I’ve prayed and waited and done right in honoring him as my father. The years have softened us both and today, we […]
Out of Sight
We wait at the end of the driveway for the school bus, Nick and I. Drizzle and gray and damp cold with no sun seen for three days straight—we know this weather well here, this time of year. Sometimes it’s hard to keep believing there’s a sun up there when all looks dreary. But […]
Uncontainable Beauty
We walked our trails together yesterday afternoon, Todd and I. Peregrine falcon floated on southeast breeze, surveying the fields for a mouse. Yellows of ash, maple reds, burnt orange of oak, and evergreen pines, spot-lit by sun, back-dropped in blue. I tried to absorb every bit of wonder. Sight of stained glass monarch wings. Smell of crisping autumn leaves. […]
True Self Love
He pulls the cinnamon raisin bagel from the toaster and does not spread butter or cream cheese. Just plain and warm. He stuffs his mouth and I watch his face contort as he chews, lips never meeting. Years ago I would have told him to close his mouth when eating, but the years have softened […]
Body Parts
My right hand is sore and partially purple from my fling with the Kitchen Aid mixer last night. Yes, I flipped the wrong lever while trying to remove the paddle and nearly mixed off my hand with the whirling. Thankfully, I pulled the plug on myself immediately, ending my misery and stopping what could have […]
All I Know
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven. These words were in my mind as I woke this morning looking out our bedroom window over paddock with horses blurred in fog and raised sun haloed, beams dissipated by water droplets floating. Autumn. My favorite season—one of many reasons I […]
Legs and Muck
She stands in the drenched paddock after the thunderstorm, fork in hands, picking horse manure. We get a lot of production here on the farm. They say an average horse drops nine tons a year. Do the math. We have four average horses. We get lots of time to think while we’re mucking stalls and picking […]
Golden Day
Today’s the day. Your golden birthday. Twenty years old on September 20th. Officially, you are no longer a teenager. And you look like a man with your hairy legs, lean and muscled body from running, and face that Dad and I still have to remind you to shave—at least on Sunday mornings. Twenty years old. […]
Time Goes By
Autumn’s crisp is in the air. I can see my breath barely as I step onto the wood planked porch watching you walk down our winding gravel drive to the bus. Your shoulders have broadened and so have your horizons. You’ve left homeschool for high school. With bigger books, with bigger words, you have moved on […]