Whenever I go looking for miracles “out there,” I am often disappointed. However, miracles have a way of sneaking up on me during everyday activities.
poetry, essays, rants, China explorations…
- Spiritual Musings
- Wapakoneta Hometown Heroes
- Reflecting
- View of a Ship: U.S.S. Murtha and the Artemis II Retrieval
- Modern “Mourning Wars”
- Three Remarkable Women
- Stony the Road…
- Finite and Infinite Games
- A Gentle “Consurrection”
- Friendly Beasts
- Gratitude over Resentment
- While Waiting for the Fever to Break
- Tangled Missions
- Bloom Where You Are (Trans)Planted
- Hallelujah Choruses
- Learned Helpfulness
- Shape Shifting
- Hymn: How Can I Keep from Singing
- Meditation/Appreciation of “We Are a Gentle, Angry People”
- Meditation/Appreciation of “Earth Was Given as a Garden”
- Meditation/Appreciation of Hymn “Light One Candle”
- Meditation on “Blessed Spirit of My Life”
- Elegy for a Middle Child
- Happy New Year, Ruthie
- Valuing Connections, Finding Joy
- Of Loaves, Fishes, and Miracles
- Wandering in the Wilderness of COVID-19
- Gardener’s Song
- The Doors of the Church are Open
- The Ripple Effects of Gratitude
- The Mixed Legacies of 9/11
- MLK, Jr. Reweaving the Dreams
- The Rich Man and Lazarus Revisited
- Birthing a Book
- Falling into Grace
- Tribute to Leonard Cohen
- International Day of Peace, September 21
- The Firebrand and the First Lady
- My Cousin Bill
- Amahoro
- Treetops (for Linda Swirczek)
- Bristlecone Pine
- Job’s Wife
- Jonah’s Dilemma (The Curse of Being Heeded)
- Everyday Wonders
- My First 4th of July Parade
- Serendipitous Synergy
- Be Kind / Practice Kindness
- In Search of Monarchs
- Vacation Rental
- Getting Ready for the Rain
- In Praise of Libraries
- Complaints of a Reluctant “Prosumer”
- Different Fall Colors
- Pre-Dawn Breezes
- San Diego Early Summer Blooms, Some Imported
- Benny the Auto Mechanic
- On Sending (and Receiving) Holiday Cards and Letters
- Liquid Amber
- On Being Granted Three Witches…
- Last Day of Summer, Southern California
- Trees Resting
- Gratitude for Late-Life Friendships
- A Post-Election-Day View
- Goodwill
- What Difference Can a Letter Make?
- Using Tools Wisely
- While We Were Away
- Playing for a Tie
- A Small White Button
- The Durability of Sisterhood
- The Shapes of our Scars
- Seeing with New Eyes
- Experiments in Car-Less Living
- What We Pay Attention To Matters:2018 Mid-Term Voting
- Aubrac’s Fields of Wild Jonquils
- Groundhog
- Why I’m Glad Our Granddaughter is a Girl Scout
- Quilted Dreams
- Mr. Whirligig
- Didace’s Garden
- Eating Out in Twenty-Nine Palms: Honoring National Service
- Winter Beach Respite
- Public-Private Partnerships
- My Father’s Afghan
- A Good Failure
- Rants
- Coming of (Nuclear) Age
- The Mixed Messages of May Day
- Thousands Upon Thousands: No Kings 3/28/2026
- Some Things Never Change: the Destiny Instinct
- The Elephants in the Room: The Size and Generalization Instincts
- The “Fear” Instinct: Danger versus Fright
- Nothing Is Coming Up Roses: the Negativity Instinct
- Minding the Voting “Gap”
- Ten November Notions
- Newsworthy?
- DEI or UIE?
- Of Smokestacks and Cliffs
- Fearing Fear Itself
- Toward a Healthier Discontent
- Hibakusha
- Seven Harmful/Helpful Political Habits: 2022 Version
- The Dobbs Case: What Would Solomon Decide?
- Fear Sells, Until…
- On to Kyiv, and Then What?
- Choosing Life
- Stuck Between Levels
- Review: The Girls Who Went Away by Ann Fessler
- The Rest of the Story
- McCarthy’s Ghost, Slavery’s Ghosts, Learning All the Verses
- Unacknowledged Cousins: “White” Womanhood Reimagined
- Checking Our Sources, Knowing Our Contexts
- Democracy Is Not an “Ism”
- Complicity
- The Flowers Have Not (Yet) Gone
- Efficiency and Resilience–Mutually Exclusive?
- Virtual Reality, Deepfakes, 1000 Hours Outside…
- Building Lop-Sided Bridges
- Children’s Crusades and Adult Enablers
- Climate Change Hope
- Coercion
- Different Angels from Montgomery
- This Year’s February 14
- Old Years’ Resolutions
- Softening Hearts, Hardening Infrastructure, Widening Perspectives
- Radio Mille Collines and the Limits to Free Speech
- Who Was Marjory Stoneman Douglas, and Why Does It Matter?
- The Other One Percent: Puerto Rico
- Living Lives that Matter
- International Women’s Day Thoughts
- White Privilege, the Capacity to Leave, and the World’s Changing Games
- Twitter Fodder
- The Myth of Objectivity: Choosing our Facts
- Practicing Gestational Politics
- Other Things Some Older People are Thinking and Need to Say Out Loud
- Toward a New Consensus: Voting Thumbs Side
- Voting with Our Feet (and other essential body parts)
- Border Stater
- Born After the War
- China W(a/o)nderings
- NC Chinese Lantern Festival, 2020
- Year of the Phoenix?
- Choosing Your Starfish
- The PRC at 70
- Pandas Playing Mahjongg–Enjoying the Cary Chinese Lantern Festival
- Is Anyone Really Stealing American Jobs?
- Dragon Kites on Tiananmen Square
- Where the Great Wall Meets the Desert
- Where the Great Wall Meets the Sea
- Chinese Girls in Frilly Dresses
- Welcoming the Year of the Rooster
- Sichuan’s Pandas, Preserved? (Part 2 of 2)
- Sichuan’s Pandas, Preserved? (part 1 of 2)
- Mid-Autumn Festival and Moon Cakes
- When the Earth Moved: Two Perspectives
- An Inconvenient Spotlight–Tiananmen 1989
- China Musings: Views from a Different Well
- The Dujiangyan Weir–Civil Engineering that Lasts
- Du Fu’s Thatched Cottage
- Earth Day in China
- Sandstorms, Yellow Air in Xinjiang
- Lantern Festival in Yangshuo, 2009
- Beasts of the Chinese Zodiac, More New Year…
- Spring Festival in Lipu
- Beach Time in Sanya
- Exotic Eats in China
- Puppies–Pets or Protein?
- Plum Blossoms in Winter
- Silent Night in China
- Mutton Dumplings for Winter Solstice
- Staying Warm, Chinese Style
- HIV/AIDS in China
- Simple Gifts
- Fall Foliage–“Huyang” Trees
- Better City, Better Life
- Music and Friendship
- Christmas by the Desert
- About
