A Beautiful Answer to Prayer
My daughter gives permission to share the following true story that just delights me: I’m tucking my daughter in bed, and she opens up and starts crying about how nobody plays with her at recess. She spends the time walking alone around the school track with her head buried in her coat. She’s not athletic […]
This Will Hurt
These past few days, I’ve been talking to students and my daughters about what it means to do the right thing. We decide this: It hurts. This generation, I’m told, avoids pain at all costs. We’ve become experts in pleasure and experts in denying and avoiding suffering. Doing the right thing hurts. When you […]
What We’re Meant For
Today I notice the Weeping Cherry, and the beautiful intricacy of the ice on her limbs captures my attention. Ice on the Weeping Cherry A swirling scaffolding of crystal sparkles in the late afternoon sun. It’s so beautiful that I almost forget how terrible this weight is for my Weeping Cherry’s fragile branches. She’s not […]
It Begins When it Ends: Saying Farewell to Students
As the semester ends at Penn State, I face these students one last time. We’ll never be together like this–in this way–again. These freshman will move on, and I’ll remain to greet the next class in January. I never know what to say on the last day. It never comes out right. Sometimes I just […]
Everything You Need
My neighbor tells me that a little mouse is wintering in the sandbox by her woodpile. Her daughter discovered him yesterday when she lifted the sandbox lid to play. Little Mouse in his Winter House The little mouse (who looks just like Mousekin from Mousekin’s Golden House) has built himself a cozy nest of leaves […]
What Not to Say While Holiday Shopping
I’m standing in line at the store, and the salespeople rush around, trying to relieve the long lines waiting at each check-out station. Every intercom announcement sounds off the code red. People are waiting! Lots of people are waiting! Hurry, hurry! A traffic jam of shopping carts blocks everyone’s path as people maneuver for the […]
Easy Does It (How to Survive the Holidays)
Tonight, we host a Christmas party for graduate students. We’ve learned, after all these years and all sorts of gatherings in our home, that easy does it. Nobody cares if my cabinets have hand prints on them. Nobody cares if I forget to dust the top of the refrigerator. Nobody cares if I don’t have […]
Unlikely Sucess
Today, Jack alerts me to a beautiful bird in the Weeping Cherry. He talks to the bird with that strange broken meowing sound, moving his jaw rapidly. I’ve wondered for years why cats make this sound when they look at birds. My husband tells me that cats imagine eating the bird and therefore make munching […]
Small Deposit, Big Return
Frost covers the clover this morning. Frost Melts on the Clover The children bend down, astonished by these small deposits of tiny white ice crystals. Children teach me that the smallest thing often holds the most wonder. I stand above the clover, and then I bow down to observe it. I marvel at the conditions […]
Something New to Try: Growing a Pineapple in Your Kitchen
Today, with my sore throat, chills, and aches, I walk around campus as one wading through swampland. What good can come of this day? I teach in a fog, drag my feet to the store, and then robot-like and half-asleep, put groceries in my cart. Pineapple is on sale. Back home, I read about the […]