My beloved Grandma, otherwise known as Gigi, always used to say, “This too shall pass.” Far more than a cliché to her, the phrase allowed her to laugh in the face of life's tragedies. Her Irish merriment, sprinkled liberally through the years, seasons me still. It broke her heart to send her husband off to…Read more Summer Will Come
hope
All That’s Lost Will Be Restored
I said good-bye to one of my dearest friends, my Grandma, yesterday. As she became more ill and I knew the end was drawing near, I was painting this piece: trying to process grief and also my great hope and faith that, even though the end of her life on earth would come, we will…Read more All That’s Lost Will Be Restored
Tommy John at 16?
The craziest thing happened recently. The roots of the story go all the way back to when my son was just a baby. He nipped at the heels of his three-years-older brother, as obsessed (or more) with anything round. If it could be picked up and thrown, they would find it; and it would fly.…Read more Tommy John at 16?
Holding Hope
Sometimes the greatest expression of love is simply to stand shoulder to shoulder, holding hope for each other.
Dandelion
Do I truly believe... when the sacred center shatters, when hope is flung like dandelion parachutes into frigid wind, when all presses down into winter sleep when all is lost... Do I truly believe... when only the hollow stalk remains, unloved, dry, cracking.. it is not the end of the story? Could it be my…Read more Dandelion
Soul on Fire
The darkness comes for us all sooner or later. Terror not of our own making magnetizes us like a black hole into unendurable pain. It often starts with an ember, a spark we try to control. But it develops a life of its own, swelling into blinding heat, into raging fire from which there is…Read more Soul on Fire
Loving You Still (Always)
I lie flat on my back in rustling shade, gazing at the wide-eyed blue eye of forever, clear as far as I can see. Then sneaking into the outer rim of my vision, billows of twirling whirligigs, shrouding the afternoon sun. I sit up, surprised, as myriad ripple across the sky, like laughter. The…Read more Loving You Still (Always)
Always (Love Never Ends)
It's been about five years since my Dad left this earth. His departure shocked me and shook me to the core of my being. Of kindred spirits, he was one of the closest. The current of mutual adoration running between us was so abruptly cut off, I was left disoriented and blind, suddenly lost…Read more Always (Love Never Ends)
The Other Side
"The light that is hard won offers the greatest illumination. A gift wrestled from bleakness will often confer a sense of sureness and grounding of the self, a strengthening proportionate to the travail of its birth." Beauty by John O'Donohue, page 79.
The Miracle of Family
For many of us in America, November fills us with profound gratitude for family, whether those we received at birth, or those we choose, or those who choose us. The loved ones with whom we gather on Thanksgiving Day are a gift beyond measure. And so I want to take this opportunity to share a…Read more The Miracle of Family
