Uncategorized
The last two weeks, as Spring has finally come to Connecticut to stay, the lengthening light of the days has been matched by the growing weight of my depression. This time, thanks to the pandemic, it isn’t all to do with my mental illness but circumstances as well. I
Uncategorized
One of the things that has surprised me about myself during these days of quiet isolation is growing disdain for Zoom. Part of it, I’m sure, is that I have to use Go to Meeting for work, which is its own special brand of hell, but there’s more
Uncategorized
The seed of this post was planted when I sent a friend a video of Jason Isbell and the $00 Unit singing “24 Frames” from isolation. As I mentioned last night, he is one of my favorite songwriters. The title of the song refers to the number of frames that
Uncategorized
When I lived in Texas, I loved the annual art show put on by the bluebonnets across fields and highway medians; it is one of the most beautiful sights I know. They are long gone by now. April in Texas is early summer. In New England, we are still wearing
Uncategorized
The subtitle to David Whyte’s book Consolations is The Solace, Nourishment, and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words. One of the words he unpacks is Istanbul. Though it makes me want to go find my They Might Be Giants CDs, I have never thought of Istanbul--the city or the word--as
Uncategorized
I finished the Gospel of Mark in the new translation by David Bentley Hart. I also finished a chapter in Tragic Sense of Life by Miguel de Unamuno, which was written in 1912 and translated by J. E. Crawford Flitch. The two translations are a century apart and aimed at
Uncategorized
Tomorrow, April 21, 2020, is our thirtieth wedding anniversary. In the course of our marriage we have lived in five cities and four states, Ginger has served four UCC churches, we have had eight residences, eight Schnauzers, and I have had five different careers. I have lost track of how
Uncategorized
I am still getting used to Sundays being a day with space. Almost thirty years of being married to a pastor has me well-conditioned to Sunday being a work day, even if it’s not my job. But for the last six Sundays, we have had time to be together
Uncategorized
I started reading the Gospel of Mark yesterday as a part of my morning reading time. I got a copy of David Bentley Hart’s new translation and took it as an invitation to dive back into the Gospels once again. Hart is an Eastern Orthodox scholar of religion and
Uncategorized
We have a standing joke around our house: Ginger likes blow-up movies and I like movies where nothing happens. What I mean is I like character-driven movies. I like characters. Two of my favorite TV shows with great characters are not happening this week. Schitt’s Creek, which is a
Uncategorized
My family and I left Africa for good on my sixteenth birthday. I turned one somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean on our way to Africa, so there was some poetry in our departure, but it was hard on all of us. We all thought we were going
Uncategorized
It has been my practice over the last several years to sort of disappear from these pages after Lent. My absence has never been intentional, but it has been consistent. As the reality of our unfortunate isolation became more apparent, I decided several week ago that I would keep writing