Aunt Berthie

When you get married, you not only marry your wife or your husband, but you are also grafted into each other’s family, and their traditions. One of Patty’s family’s Memorial Day traditions was to visit the various small town cemeteries where loved ones were buried to place flowers on their… Continue reading

Pro (All of) Life

This post is part of the July 2015 synchroblog that invited bloggers to write about “What It Means To Be Pro-Life.” My fifty-seven year-old friend has been fighting for her life for over a month and half, after having emergency surgery to repair complications from a previous surgery. She is… Continue reading

Juicy Fruit

Have you ever taken a bite out of a perfectly ripened peach that was hanging from a tree jut a short time ago? There is a certain stance you need to assume when eating a good peach, so the juice doesn’t drip all over you, but it may still run… Continue reading

Repurposed

All of the photos of are of the vintage garden apartment where I wrote this post. For the last couple of days, I have done pretty much nothing. It’s called a vacation, really, a three-day mini get-a-way. We came to place where there is nothing to do, and are staying in a… Continue reading

Penelope and the Crutch

.Penelope loved life and lived it at full throttle. She admired her daddy, emulating his mischievous little grin and his love of ornery escapades. There was an effervescence about her that, at times, just had to bubble over like a well-shaken bottle of Coke. After 9th grade gym class, her… Continue reading

Why My Kids Will Never Forget When They “Forgot” Me

This post is part of a synchrobog in which we recount our favorite prank. The links to the other writer’s contributions are listed at the end of this post. After work, the kids and I met Patty at Giordano’s, a deep dish, Chicago-style pizza place in a neighboring suburb. Upon… Continue reading

The Ministry of Presence

This month’s synchroblog focuses on helping Christians know what to do (or not do) and what to say (or not say) when others are going through times of personal tragedy. Links to the other writer’s contributions are listed at the end of the post.  You will want to check them… Continue reading

Christmas Surgery

It was one of those times in life when everything else seems to stop and all of the important and pressing matters are no longer important or pressing.  I remember it like it happened in slow motion. Patty and I were walking along main street in the Kansas City suburb… Continue reading

Gr-attitude

This post is part of a synchroblog on gratitude as a spiritual practice. The other contributions are listed at the end of this post. I don’t exactly feel like the most qualified person to write about gratitude. If the topic were complaining or ranting, I would be in more familiar territory. When… Continue reading

Life

This post is part of a synchroblog, entitled, Choosing my Religion. The participating writers are answering the question, “If you could change to any other religion in the world (other than Christianity), which would you choose and why?” The links to their contributions are posted at the end of this post. I am cheating. I… Continue reading

Margaritas, Metallica, and a Serious Case of the Giggles

After a couple (or was it three) very potent Margaritas and several hands of Rummy, someone said something that I found amusing at the time and I broke out in uncontrollable giggling. When I say giggling, I mean I sounded like a Junior High girl. And when I say uncontrollable, I… Continue reading

Kingdom Come or Kingdom Now?

What difference would it make if Jesus did not rise from the dead? We would be following a martyr, instead of a victor. The church may never have developed without the reassurance of the resurrected Jesus. The message of his followers may have been one of revenge and bad news,… Continue reading

Demystifying Hope

“You can live forty days without food, four days without water, four minutes without air, but not even four seconds without hope.” – Anonymous Hope Described It is laborious and depressing to try to muddle on when you feel hopeless. In my own precarious situation, I have noticed that the… Continue reading

Underwear for Christmas

Many Christmases ago when my nephew was at the height of the cool toy stage of life, he tore into one of his gifts from my parents, his grandparents, to make the awful discovery that his practical-minded grandma had given him the gift of tidy whities. They were not cool boxers… Continue reading

Antithetical Advent

My favorite NFL team lost today… by a wide point spread … to a really bad team… on the heels of a four game winning streak, and I didn’t like it one bit! I hate expectations! I really hate them when they are projected on me and I am almost always disappointed… Continue reading

Pretty People

This post is part of the synchroblog, Down We Go. We all have our prejudices. Personally, I am leery of people who appear to have it all together. Right now, I am recalling the proper, Christian Grandmother who kept the birth of her granddaughter secret because she was born before her mother… Continue reading