I generally dislike allegory. I’m in good company. J.R.R. Tolkien once said, “I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence.” I never could connect with Pilgrim’s Progress. Nevertheless, I have no problem with the allegorical elements of Godhanger by…
Many years ago, the speaker at a women’s breakfast asked, “Does anyone know where the custom of spring cleaning began?” The words escaped my lips without a second thought, “With my mother-in-law!” The room exploded with laughter. Good thing Mom had a sense of humour. I wasn’t altogether joking, though. She was the one who…
I believe in the magic of make-believe, the power of one’s imagination and the beauty of simplicity. So did Mr. Dressup. For those who didn’t grow up watching this kind and creative man, watching the documentary entitled “Mr. Dressup: The Magic of Make Believe” will make you wish you had. While enjoying this film, I…
Steel-grey clouds cluttered the sky as I drove, interrupted only by a few scattered patches of bright blue. On the distant horizon shafts of rain plunged straight down from heaven to earth. In the rear-view mirror, far behind me, the sun shone, growing weaker with every mile I travelled. Typical autumn weather in Ontario –…
The jar of roasted red peppers slipped from my hands and shattered on the grocery store floor around my sandaled feet. In my rush to get through checkout before the toddler melted down and back home for the baby’s nap, I clumsily dropped the jar onto the tiles. “No!” yelled my three-year-old, who shares my…
The last book my dad loaned me was Henri Nouwen’s Reaching Out. It’s a strange little book from 1975, all about loneliness. His copy is full of notes, shaky underlines, and emphatic arrows. Twenty years ago, when he first got sick, I read those marked-up passages so often I nearly memorized them. I hadn’t thought…
August 11 marks one year since the death of the writer and ordained pastor Frederick Buechner. His spiritual memoir The Alphabet of Grace was originally presented as a lecture 54 years ago. What possible relevance could this slim volume of scarcely one hundred pages have? In this insightful and poetic memoir, Buechner writes about an…
“As long as we are not quite sure we are unworthy, God will keep narrowing us in until he gets us alone.” Oswald Chambers There’s a kind of loneliness that almost befriends you. A kind that wraps around me, scarf-like, as I ski across the fields. The snow is much like I imagine manna would…
It was a slippery patch of white, that driveway, and soon I found my all-season tires stuck in snow. I was late already for the girls’ tap lessons, all three of them strapped into the backseat, and now this. Now I would need to admit to my in-laws that I couldn’t back up straight out…
It might have been my worst birthday yet: a four a.m. wake-up call from a child who hasn’t slept well since we uprooted years ago. A child with a stomach bug. Another’s meltdown that involved screams so deep they felt existential (and maybe like mourning). A job that has always felt beyond my grasp, which…
“Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have” (1 Peter 3:15). I’m eating caramel cake and my friend is drinking a Huckleberry latte. The sun flirts with the clouds, and I flirt with my army green jacket. Passersby come and go,…
A long-time friend stopped by for a quick visit, one of only a handful in the past two years. But while the chat was welcome, the stilted politeness was new and awkward. We never talk about it, but she and I both know we’ve moved in different directions with respect to pandemic-related questions. That day,…
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