One of the things I often find is when I become aware of something I begin to notice it everywhere, which leaves me wondering if I see it everywhere because I’m looking for it or if I am just slow to the switch when it comes to catching on to stuff. The last couple of…
I have offered music posts most every Advent that I have been writing, so I thought I would keep up the tradition here in the middle of the season. These are not Christmas songs, or specifically Advent songs, but they are songs that speak to me in these days, songs that offer cold comfort. Most…
For about twenty-five Advent seasons, I opened the services at our church (whichever church that was) with “Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord” from Godspell. That tradition didn’t make the move to Guilford, but the song is tattooed on my heart. The scripture passage for my sermon today alludes to Isaiah’s words, and it…
worn and wounded in my notes I found this phrase what is worn is not always wounded I’ve been staring at it for some time now trying to decide if I agree (and I think I wrote it) I think I was thinking about library lions whose tails are worn by the affectionate of book…
Stephen Sondheim died last week, as you probably know. His death last week affected me in several ways, not the least of which was taking me back to an afternoon in the Spring of 1988 when my friend Billy Crockett and I wandered up to the TKTS booth in Times Square and scored two half-price…
I can tell by watching the clip that it happened a long time ago–1996 to be exact–but I saw it for the first time this week: Patti LaBelle singing “This Christmas” at the National Christmas Tree Lighting and getting to the part where the background singers are supposed to sing, “This Christmas,” but nobody sings….
sundowning some twenty winters ago I learned to leave the house before sundown so I do not go down with it outside the darkness feels expansive the house feels like a tomb the darkness is not the problem my depression pulls the house down wait–say that again the darkness is not the problem my depression…
On this last day of November, the only leaves on the trees belong to the evergreens. A post about what I learned from the autumn leaves is woefully late, especially in a culture that puts out Halloween calendar in mid-August, but such is the nature of my life in these days. One of those who…
Stephen Sondheim died last week. He had Thanksgiving dinner with friends and died on Friday, unexpectedly it seems. Looking back through my texts, I heard about his death around six on Friday, because that is when I wrote a friend with whom I share a love of Sondheim and his songs. I was in the…
I began serving as the bridge interim pastor at Westbrook Congregational Church UCC in Westbrook, Connecticut this morning. I will be there until the Sunday after Easter while they complete their search for a settled pastor. My post to begin my Advent Journal for this year is the manuscript of my sermon. It is specific…