I took a break from presenting this summer to work on a new book. Then, having turned in my manuscript to my publisher, I took a break from writing with daily word-count goals. Going off-line and on the road, I took the advice of a friend and left my hefty journal behind. Get something fresh […]
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Two downy woodpeckers visit the deck in the morning. The female fat with eggs sits on the railing. The male flits between feeder and mate, feeder and mate, seed by seed feeding a future not yet nested. It is coded within whether we’re winged or flat-footed, this care across time. How much we humans have […]
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Finally, spring has arrived. Even so, I hear many folks growing weary of the political storms blowing about every day. The blustery posturing that hawks fear like a street peddler desperate to make a sale. On many a day, I find it hard to believe in the seasonal rising of hope that typically blooms in […]
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Forty to one. That’s the ratio of sap to maple syrup in the long, slow process of creating the amber sweetness my family used to boil and bottle every spring. It’s a ratio that tells you something about the time and determination required to make syrup, but gives no hint of the longer arc of […]
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Three years ago this week, David and I retreated to the north shore of Lake Superior in early March. It was his spring break and we’d decided to buck the trend of going south, instead embracing the last remnants of winter by bundling up for a few blue-sky days of subzero sunshine. Outside our window, […]
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It is not a far drive from the Cities, but the stars at night will tell you it is far enough — to gain a new view, to see distant light not always apparent at home, to hear the gifts carried by silence. The Christine Center, where I was recently on retreat, welcomes all visitors with […]
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As I write this, the snow is swirling outside my window so fully I can’t see the pine trees just 20 feet away. It brings to mind an extraordinary and terrifying passage in a favorite novel, Driftless, by David Rhodes. The scene takes place in the winter on a Wisconsin farm, where Graham and Cora […]
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