Magical Memoir Moments
The Ultimate Touchstone of Friendship: Witness
Mary, Tina, and Gloria were the main characters in the mini memoir of my life called The College Years. Here we are about to graduate. Tina appears to have the stage. There were a few things we still didn’t know. 🙂 Like all graduates, we had no idea of where we would ultimately live, travel,…
Commencement: Go Where There Is No Path
“Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail,” –Ralph Waldo Emerson. Graduation Day 1970. I was nervous and excited. My friend Elvin and I were the student commencement speakers. We marched with the college president. After that day, we would not see each other…
When the Lost Thing Appears: The Completion of a Circle
A month ago, I looked everywhere I could think of for Spring Banquet photos. Then last week, looking for a photo of our friend Joel, I found the two pictures that had eluded my search. Here is the date who found the corsage I lost. Sometimes when our minds are totally consumed by other thoughts,…
Our Friend Joel’s Life Legacy: Eternal Laughter and Love
I had planned to write about graduation. Now it is otherwise. I had planned to enjoy a riotous old age with this man as friend. Now it is otherwise. Our friend Joel, cartoonist, script writer, story teller, died May 8. He was walking with his wife Nancy. The hidden clot in his lung grabbed him….
The Red, Red Rose of Memory: A Surprise Update
This rose is 48 years old. When it dropped from my shoulder in the dark, my date promised to come back the next morning and look for it. He found it along the path we walked on College Avenue. Why do I still have this rose? Because my “date” became my husband. And his trip…
An Old Tree Growing Stronger: The Thrill of Discovering My Younger Self
Walking across campus with my college sweetheart brings back many memories. Outside the chapel, a tree stopped my in my tracks. “This is the one!” I exclaimed. I recognized the branches, remembered climbing into them as a college senior. I rushed home to look at the yearbook picture again. Do you see what I see?…
Do You Have a Landscape of Love? A Walk Down Memory Lane
This is Northlawn, my college dorm, 1966-1969. I fell in love with Stuart in the spring of 1967. He was a grand senior. I was a lowly “frosh.” Stuart pinned a red rose corsage on my lime green Spring Banquest dress while I stood on the porch of that dorm. Now, after 45 years of…
Seven Lessons from My Lenten Sabbatical
I expected that a Lenten Fast would give me a time to rest. I craved a less active, more contemplative, life. Did I get it? Well, yes. What improved? Exercise. At least an hour/day of stretching, weights, walking, yoga, and even a little jogging. I feel stronger and leaner, especially when I wear Spandex biking…
Grandparenting: How it Helps Us to Simplify
I’m sitting at my desk, looking out at the mountains, and thinking about speaking to more than 100 Mennonite women this Friday night at the Amigo Centre, a place I know well, not too far from Sturgis, Michigan. The subject is Recovering Simplicity, a topic that Mennonites have grappled with for a long time and…
Three Things Every Grandparent Learns Again and Every Wise Parent Knows
Today’s post was going to be about children and memoir storytelling. I had it all set up like this: The post would be the third in a series of how my grandchildren are my spiritual teachers. The first post (2011) was about learning attention and proprioception (awareness of the body) from a baby. The second…