I watch the sun on the western horizon all year. Its setting spot barely moves near Solstices, but in February, the sun travels north over the oak and pine canopy in plain sight from my windows. Up close, oak, hickory, and birch leaves cover the forest floor, protecting hidden seeds waiting for warmer days. Tree […]

Snow pelted the windows and obscured the black night sky. It was 6 pm and my husband Vic was usually home by 5:30. I’d been through this before because we lived in a lake effect snow area near Lake Ontario. I stood at the window watching for car lights, but no one was out on […]

April 18, 2009 Dearest Elaine, …Ross (86, Marion’s husband) and I (80) laugh many times with our faulty hearing…. Tears and laughter are now two sides of one feeling. I love every workshop, but I’m finding my energy not up to it—not quite. I say my prayers and my love and blessings go to you, […]

Seasons in the New York Finger Lakes go from frigid cold in mid winter to blistering hot in summer, but each month brings gifts of beauty.                   I was thrilled to spot the first bluebirds in March and see my son David at his home in April. […]

Italian sun glowed through stained glass windows in the upper Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, but we headed for the crypt beneath the cathedral. The Poverty and Simplicity of Saint Francis had been covered by grandeur and gold within a few years of his death nearly a thousand years ago, but I hoped for […]

The morning after Sankara’s funeral, we slowly walked the dusty road to the Sankara Mutt (temple) and bought flower garlands from a vender on the corner. The modest cement area where we’d meditated with the sage, where he’d lived and blessed his devotees, and where they held his funeral ritual the day before was quiet […]