For though a righteous man falls seven times, he rises again. —Proverbs 24:16a NIV Our first kitten was a doozy. Her name was Tiger Lily—“Lily” was added to let folks know she was a girl, but “Tiger” was her descriptive name. Her antics kept us wavering from laughter to consternation. Early in her career as a jumper, Tiger Lily repeatedly tried and failed to leap high enough to reach the top of our dining room hutch. It was an elusive goal that tormented her—and us as we watched her attempts and failures! She would size it up, then crouch and spring. She would hit the side of the hutch with a frightening force and fall to the ground over and over. We tried to warn […] Read more »

… for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. —1 Peter 1:6b-7 Written November 11, 2019: I’m typing this particular Musing in the waiting room at Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine. My beloved daddy is here. Today is his 86th birthday. He and my mother have been married since 1955 and love each other deeply. His precious heart needs a new valve and four bypasses, but surgery is presently on hold while doctors wait, allowing his body to grow a bit stronger for […] Read more »

Kind words are like honey— sweet to the soul and healthy for the body. —Proverbs 16:24 NLT Ask my husband. Or my children. Or anyone who knows me. I talk a lot. I love words. I love speaking them and writing them. Evidently, I even talk in my sleep. I guess I still have words left over at the end of the day. I’m one who looks at her half full plate of food when everyone else has finished eating and wonders why on earth I still have so much left. And then someone kindly reminds me that it *might* be because I was talking as much as I was eating. [Sigh.] This ability to easily talk, to write, to string words together is a […] Read more »

You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. —Psalm 139:16 NLT I’ll never forget her. I came down the stairs, still a bit groggy with sleep, into her welcoming kitchen. She was busy at the stove preparing a big breakfast for me and her other guests, and she was smiling … through some tears. She’d lost a son several years before, and the memory of him was still fresh (could it ever not be when a mother loses her child?). “You know,” she shared, “I was stirring the eggs a minute ago, feeling miserable, when I realized that this was the year my son should […] Read more »