At this time of year, we have many opportunities to join together with family and friends, to celebrate, to tell stories, to share memories. Because these holidays are most often colored in happy hues and we look forward to good food and fun-filled events with family and friends, it is easy to focus on happy memories, memories that we treasure and tell again year after year. But memories are not always happy. Bad things happen. Sometimes these memories are of... Read more
We all make a decision every day, consciously or unconsciously: Am I going to cooperate today? Perhaps the question is cooperation with a partner. Or the kids. Or a neighbor. Or the people at school or work. Are we going to “go along to get along,” as the old saying goes? How much of ourselves are we going to give away? Because it feels like that sometimes, doesn’t it? That cooperation is giving parts of yourself away? Dr. Joshua D.... Read more
People regularly say to me that they wouldn’t want to live in California, because they would miss the seasons. As a California native who has lived in a variety of other places, I understand this. Who would want to miss the seasons of Oh My God it is Really Snowing in April, or It’s So Hot and Humid I Literally Feel as if I Am Melting? But the fact that we give those lovely seasons a miss doesn’t mean that... Read more
Everyone has to make a living somehow. Some weekends, my job has me blessing unions in the name of the Holy. All kinds of people end up finding each other. Once, it was somebody raised in the Black church tradition marrying someone whose family had been Hindu since before time began. So out I went to the Hindu Community Center, for an evening cram session with one of the priests. To get there, you take the last exit west of... Read more
Last Sunday, while out to lunch with my husband and two young kids, we passed the time waiting for our food by playing Mad Libs. As you might remember, Mad Libs is a word game where one player asks another player to provide a particular kind of word – noun, verb, adjective, etc. – to fill in the blanks of a story. After the words are provided, randomly and without context, the other player reads the funny and often nonsensical... Read more
Let’s face it, progressives just don’t do fear well. Conservatives go to town with death panels and black helicopters, while progressives build arguments. It’s true in religion; it’s true in politics: progressives live in Reasonville while conservatives scare the hell into people. Take, for example, Pascal’s Wager, one of the enduring arguments concerning the god concept. Blaise Pascal was a Seventeenth Century French mathematician whose work led directly to probability theory, game theory, and calculus. Pascal understood that none of... Read more
Beloved Community is ever on my mind lately, both who we are and who we can be. My meditations are guiding me toward increasing clarity about my vision of Beloved Community – it cannot be a state of perfection. Because humans are essential elements in Beloved Community, it is/will be cluttered and messy if it is to be realized. In my favorite writing book, author Anne Lamott describes clutter and mess as something that shows us “that life is being... Read more
I really do not like waiting. I will put something back on a shelf rather than wait in a long check-out line. I will shop online, choose a different restaurant, come back later, or change my plans altogether to avoid a line. I hate waiting for a bus too. Why stand and wait when I can start walking now? Usually, the bus passes me as I am chugging along down the street. It does not phase me. At least I... Read more
A magazine I once read had a feature on “Southern hospitality.” I remember the photos: a big porch with white pillars. A carved wooden pineapple hung by the door. Inside, some plump sofas and delicate curtains. A life of plenty and ease. I’d be willing to be pampered in a setting like that. But, to me, “Southern hospitality” will always look less like that mansion, and more like a one-room apartment in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. For a time in my life,... Read more
by Pablo Neruda (translation by David Breeden) Now, let’s all count to twelve, then keep still. For once on this earth, let’s speak in no language. For once let’s stop and not move our arms so much. That would be a fragrant moment, without hurry, without movement; we would all be together in an instantaneous . . . disquiet. The fisherman in the cold sea would not hurt the whales, and the worker in the salt would look at his... Read more
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