The Princess first came to LaBelle last summer, and stayed for months. She was a tiny little girl, barely bigger than a toddler, the granddaughter of a friendly man who lives down the street. Every single day she would wear some emblem of royalty with her clothing: a plastic crown from the dollar store, or a pair of gauze fairy wings, or a pink satin dress-up princess dress over fuzzy pajamas. She never left the house without her... Read more
I met a new friend at nearly midnight, last weekend. Michael had just gotten off a late shift. It was quite dark and chilly. One of his regular customers was still in the restaurant as he ate his dinner after a twelve hour shift. The customer was on the phone, arguing loudly with a cab company. I suppose that Steubenville is the only place on earth where you can’t get an Uber or a Lyft. Back when I didn’t have... Read more
Have you ever thought about the way changing a name can change your whole perspective? If you follow medical news at all, you might have heard that a consensus of health organizations has changed the name of the chronic illness that up until yesterday was called poly-cystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). The sickness formerly known as PCOS, is now called ‘polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome” (PMOS). There’s no change in the official list of symptoms, the treatment or the diagnostic criteria, just... Read more
It hurts to go to Mass alone on Mothers’ Day. I’ve healed so much the past several years, but sometimes the old hurts still sting. I am happy hundreds of days out of three hundred sixty-five, every year for the past two or three years, but sometimes the old grief chokes me. Sometimes I catch myself being happy, and it feels unfamiliar, which reminds me of the feelings underneath. The other night I had that dream I thought... Read more
Things go on as they always have, with variations. The guinea pig is elderly but active as ever, and she likes to graze on weeds while I prepare the garden for summer. I’ve got plants nearly bursting out of their pots in the dining room, just waiting for the night time temperature to stop dipping below forty, just like every May. The cat likes to go in and out of her basement hideaway so often that when I... Read more
The discourse is on the death penalty again. My veteran readers know that I am against the death penalty because I’m a Catholic who tries to hold a consistent life ethic. That’s what Catholics are supposed to do, and I’m doing my best. So I wasn’t at all surprised when Pope Leo XIV reiterated what we already knew last Tuesday: “The Catholic Church has consistently taught that each human life, from the moment of conception until natural death, is sacred... Read more
The sunflowers will not stop. In 2023, I planted a few different varieties of sunflower in my garden to see what would happen. I ended up with great towering blooms that I left to dry out until frost as a treat for the birds. The birds dropped seeds. The next year, and every year thereafter, I have had scores of free cross-pollenated sunflowers, growing out of the garden beds and the compost. Every year I transplant as many as... Read more
I don’t want to talk about modesty. In fact, I refuse to talk about modesty. It’s the least interesting subject in all of internet Catholic discourse and it just doesn’t matter to me anymore. I don’t want to talk about modesty any more than I want to talk about felt banners (which I don’t mind) or tambourines (which I loathe) or the song “Mary, Did You Know?” The modesty discourse is a meme from 2019 and we all need... Read more
I can’t tell you what it’s like to be a good Christian. But I can tell you a few things about nature, in northern Appalachia, in the springtime. I hadn’t seen nearly enough of nature this Spring. I had been so tired. I was finishing up my school year of classes at the church outreach, nearly done for the year but not quite. I was trying to get things in order to plant the backyard garden since it’s nearly May.... Read more
I saw that photo, of an IDF soldier smashing a crucifix in Lebanon. I saw it several times. Everywhere I scrolled on social media, I saw it: a rather pink plaster corpus, upside down with his feet in the air, and a man slamming into it with a great big hammer. It hurt just to look at, and as I looked, a thousand images ran through my mind– not words or sentences or morals of the story, just images and... Read more
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