There is a reason why I never speak about Lizzy and Cecilia’s father. For most of Lizzy’s life I was trapped in a broken marriage with someone who never wanted to be a husband or a father. As a result, I was a single mother to Lizzy while I was still married and a divorced…
There is a wrongness about death that feels inescapable, as illogical as this is. The entire structure of the created world is that of decay and regeneration, and yet, the death of a human person feels like it must be avoided at all costs. We cannot accept it. Something about it feels unnatural, wrong, inhuman….
. . . and behold! a third theme grew amid the confusion, and it was unlike the others. For it seemed at first soft and sweet, a mere rippling of gentle sounds in delicate melodies; but it could not be quenched, and it took to itself power and profundity. And it seemed at last that…
There is a term called “existential loneliness,” indicating that the very state of being human is to be alone, to suffer alone, to die alone. Some argue we are living in an epidemic of loneliness, even before this pandemic and social isolation. I have heard doctors refer to cancer cells as “acting out of a…
I just thought of one thing that’s permanent. Love. – Olaf, Frozen 2 September 29, 2020 Cecilia lay fitfully beside me, fading in and out of sleep. Again and again, she veered towards consciousness, crying briefly and bumping her head against the headboard, unable to settle and unable to sleep. I murmured meaningless noises, trying…
Mightier than Este is Nienna, sister of the Feanturi; she dwells alone. She is acquainted with grief, and mourns for every wound that Arda has suffered in the marring of Melkor. So great was her sorrow, as the Music unfolded, that her song turned to lamentation long before its end, and the sound of mourning…
There is a mama doe and her two fawns that live outside of my sister’s house. I see them almost every day, when driving home from an appointment, when leaving to go on a walk, when taking a piece of mail to the mailbox in the evening, or when stepping outside in the morning sunshine…
“How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when, in your heart, you begin to understand… there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep… that have taken hold.” – Frodo in The Return of the King…
“Are you in pain, Frodo?’ said Gandalf quietly as he rode by Frodo’s side. ‘Well, yes I am,’ said Frodo. ‘It is my shoulder. The wound aches, and the memory of darkness is heavy on me. It was a year ago today.’ ‘Alas! there are some wounds that cannot be wholly cured,’ said Gandalf. ‘I…