Some friendships are a never-ending story that flows through years like wind through wheat, slowing at times, but always picking up wherever it left off.

I met Roscoe a very long time ago at a Young Life camp. His name isn’t really Roscoe. My late husband called him that. He’ll always be Roscoe to me. [Read more…]

It was a lot to pack into one short week. But everything fits in matters of the heart.

We are what is known as a “blended family.” When my husband and I married eight years ago, I was a widow, he was divorced. Our children (my three, his two) were grown. They never had to share a bathroom or fight over who ate the last gallon of ice cream. But somehow, they became friends. [Read more…]

His first trip to Yosemite National Park was the summer he turned 3. I have an old photo of a woolly-headed little boy, grinning ear to ear, standing in the river with his arms stretched wide as if to say, “Look! God made this place just for me!” [Read more…]

(Note: I’m taking off this week for vacation. The following column is a repeat from August, 2009.)

First loves are hard to forget.

I was 7 the summer my grandmother took my hand to lead me out to her garden.I counted the steps from the porch to the yard. My legs were short. She had to stop on each step and wait for me, but she didn’t seem to mind. I remember the rustle of her starched skirt, the warmth of her hand and the sound of her humming a happy little tune.

It wasn’t really a song, she said, just the music that played in her heart. She always hummed going to the garden. [Read more…]

I shouldn’t admit this. I might regret it later. But I have to tell you: The Fourth of July has never been my favorite holiday. There are several good reasons, not one of which has anything to do with patriotism or the lack of it.

Growing up in the ’50s, in the rural South, children were taught that we were blessed to be born in the greatest nation on Earth, and we should never take that gift for granted. [Read more…]

It seems I have a love-hate relationship with the sun.

When I was a child, I could swear the sun would reach down with its long fingers and beckon me to follow it. It got me into trouble more than once. [Read more…]

It happened in only seconds. One minute we were laughing, and the next, we were in a panic, looking under beds, between cushions, behind doors.

Life changes just that fast. [Read more…]

On a recent flight — one of 20 that I’ve been on in the past two months — I wrestled my carry-on into the overhead bin and collapsed in a seat on the aisle. I was hoping to get lucky and have an empty seat beside me to stretch out in. Apparently, a flight attendant read my mind.

“We have a full flight today,” she announced, “so please place smaller items under the seat in front of you and leave the overhead bin for larger items that won’t fit below.”

An image flashed in my brain: Me, curled up, sound asleep and grinning in the overhead bin. [Read more…]

Lately I seem to spend a lot of time watching little things.

This morning it was quail chicks. There were eight of them, with their mama and daddy, all scratching and pecking at the bird seed on the ground outside my window.

I sit at that window for hours, pecking on a computer like Big Bird in bifocals pecking at seed, pretending to work while really just watching those chicks.

I wish you could see them. [Read more…]

I am lucky.

Randy says so.

Two months ago, when I left his house to fly back to mine after a long and happy visit, my 2-year-old grandson woke from his nap and asked his mother, “Where is Nana?” [Read more…]