Magical Memoir Moments
Things My Father Said: A Message from the Grave
They say that eyes are the windows to the soul. My father’s eyes look different to me in the few pictures I have from his last years. The one below gave me shivers when it appeared last week on Facebook. The photo comes from the 1979 Lititz, Pennsylvania, high school yearbook, The Warrian. Daddy’s last…
How to Get Ready to Die: Easter Lessons from My Mennonite Mother
“Just don’t say, ‘She fell into the arms of Jesus.’” We were talking about death and funerals, fun topics for a 65-year-old woman and her 87-year-old mother. When Mother described the clichés and embellished phrases of some obituaries, we both howled in recognition, eager to reduce the serious, universal, subject of death with just enough…
The Year of Magical Thinking: A Memoir to Read and Reread
When Joan Didion’s husband John Gregory Dunne dropped dead on December 30, 2003, he was in the middle of a speaking a sentence in their living room. She was mixing a salad for their dinner. As I write these words, Stuart and I are about to sit down to eat the dinner the two of…
Love and Death: Forrest Church's Testimony and a Mini-Memoir
Forrest Church’s voice rings in my head today. I finished his memoir last night, and many of his themes are ones deeply embedded in my own life. His 2008 book, Love & Death: My Journey Through the Valley of the Shadow, published by Beacon Press, focuses on the two big ideas of the title, especially…