In Gennesaret

I’ve been hearing recently about a new trend: sober vacations. People are intentionally planning trips that are devoid of any alcoholic content. Whole industries are growing around this concept – travel agencies, resorts, cruises. This apparently follows on the heels of other similar trends – namely, Sober October and Dry January. It seems that the former began in the U.K. as a fundraiser for cancer research. On the other hand, Dry January just sounds like a health thing. Try not drinking any alcohol for a month and see what the health benefits are. And people found the benefits were plentiful and started telling everyone about it. And my reaction was, Uhhh . . . what? Is this really news? ALL my months are dry and sober -- at least most of them. I very rarely drink alcohol. Mainly because nobody drank in my house growing up, and my college roommate abstained because of her alcoholic father (and I hung with her in support), so I just never developed a real taste for the stuff – an...

I know a bit of Spanish. Un poquito. So when I volunteered to tutor a young Mexican lady in English a couple decades ago, I wasn’t sure how well that was going to go. But it did go well – mainly because Blanca was bright and motivated. For our second lesson, we met at a grocery store. With a notebook in hand, she pointed at things, and I named each item in English. She learned far more on her own than she did from me; I was merely an available person for intentional conversation. And for the answering of questions . . . like this question that she asked me one day: “What means, ‘Ado tiso?’” Ado tiso . . . hmm . . . I asked her to give me a situation where she heard this phrase. She described a couple scenarios and repeated the phrase with a strong lilt, trying to mimic the people she heard. “Ah-doh TEE-so!” I was genuinely puzzled for quite a while. But then it hit me. She was trying to say, “I don’t think so.” That became an inside joke in my home for quite a while. “Can I h...

This photo – I don’t know if it speaks to any of you. It was hard to capture the image effectively. This was the view above me while I was sitting at my outdoor table one afternoon during the Christmas break. I had been reading, and when I finished a chapter, I set the book down and laid my head back to look around. It was beautiful. The colors! Can you see how blue that sky is? It’s a remarkable blue . . . a soft, gentle, clear blue. In the winter in Iowa, I would walk my daughter to the bus stop with snow on the ground all around us and notice that the sky was as white as the snow. I remember thinking that the world looked like an empty coloring book. Not in Texas. Look at that blue, blue sky in December. And the leaves. The green! Not all the trees around me have green leaves on them in the winter, but this big, beautiful live oak that I sit under in the backyard does, even in December. And the contrast of those green leaves against that blue sky with the sun shining down . . ...

Create in me a clean heart . . . I don’t remember where this verse popped up over the holidays, but it has been on my mind ever since. And with it comes the old worship chorus – specifically Keith Green’s live rendition because YouTube Music keeps bringing it around again in my playlist in the car. So, join me in a bit of Bible study here, and feel free to sing along. Create in me a clean heart, ohhh God . . . A clean heart . . . what makes my heart unclean? We modern folk hear the word and think of plain old dirtiness, requiring Lysol and a scrub brush, but I’m not sure that’s what we’re talking about. Lepers in biblical times were called unclean. So, there seems to be a connotation of disease here. And those lepers had to keep away from others because their disease was contagious. So maybe we’re even talking about something that somebody else could catch if they were too close to me? That’s sobering. When I look this passage up in the Blue Letter Bible online ( love that r...

A couple weeks ago, I mentioned on Facebook that I was thinking about watching all the Star Wars movies. I saw the first one in the theater in 1977, but I never saw the others. FB friends wanted to hear my reactions – so here you are: Episode 4 – A New Hope (? When did it get that title?) - How did I sit through this and understand it when I was nine? I don’t think I did understand it. I’m not sure I really understood it all at 56. - I was bored through the first half. Bored enough that I had to watch it again because in the second half I got into it and wondered what I missed in the first half. - So, honestly, the effects are good enough even fifty years later to not be a big distraction . . . and that’s pretty amazing. I bet they blew people away at the time. - It’s unfortunate how much this has been parodied. I feel like I’m watching a spoof. “Use the force, Luke.” I almost laughed at that. It’s hard to take it seriously sometimes. I have to keep reminding myself that thi...

I love teaching Drama. And I love my dedicated Drama students . . . like my two senior girls who are in their fourth and fifth years with me in Drama class right now. These two took on the task of writing the play for this year’s Christmas program – and then casting and directing it. They’ve been working on this since June, and it all culminated last Tuesday night. I’m so proud of them. It was a kick sitting with them in the front pew just before the program started. “I can’t believe this is finally happening!” one of them squealed. A classmate had asked them earlier in the day what it was like to see their own play coming together on stage. “Weird – and scary,” was their consensus. (Yep! Been there.) But their excitement over the whole experience was palpable . . . and contagious. “It’s so weird . . . being here in the audience and not up there on stage,” one reflected. “It’s like, I have no control over any of it anymore.” (YES, SISTER. I feel your pain! That was one of the bigg...

In the past thirty-five years, I have lived in seven different cities in six different states. My current stint in San Antonio has been the longest: I’ve been here for eleven years. The longest before that was in New Jersey for ten. The rest of that time was in various spots in the Midwest, the region of the country where I grew up and that I most identify with. To echo a Christmas classic, it’s been a wonderful life. At least an interesting one, that’s for sure. Just in case you are not aware, New Jersey is a very different place from the Midwest. That move was quite the culture shock, friends. And Texas! Oh, y’all . . . it's a country to itself. But the dramatic cultural differences have not been a trial to me. They've actually been educational. And often entertaining. But there are other trying differences I’ve had to deal with that had more lasting impact on me. Curiously, in each place I’ve lived (at least since I’ve been a mother), I’ve somehow ended up in the . . ....