We left North Carolina on our fifth wedding anniversary, August 18, 2023 and spent a week driving across the country, seeing family and friends in TN and Atlanta on our way, and finally arrived in Denver, CO. I gave us about a week and a half to move, settle in, and have couple of days before my first day of work at my new job.

The church greeted me on my first Sunday with a beautiful reversible white and red stole - white for communion, All Saints’ Sunday, Trinity Sunday, Christmas, Epiphany, weddings, funerals, and red for Pentecost - AND a COSTCO cake. The vanilla cream filled kind with the amazing buttercream frosting.

I have loved being in this role. From the beginning, from the moment I was flown out for a second interview to lamenting with Andrew on the phone after my interview that the follow up interview was only 15 minutes and I didn’t get to ask all of my questions so they probably hated me,

to getting a call shortly after the interview offering me the job, to boarding the wrong bus to get to Union Station to wait for the train to the Denver airport and riding 80 stops in the wrong direction -EIGHTY. STOPS - I have been gobsmacked by the process, and that this is what I get to do.

For years during job interviews, when asked “where do you see yourself in however many years,” or “what is your ultimate role?” my answer has been “I am very attuned to the nuances of spiritual care with older adults, and I find tremendous meaning in that. I would love to direct a spiritual care program with older adults, and have occasional opportunities to preach.”

Well, guess what? I direct a spiritual care program with older adults and I have weekly opportunities to preach.

Dream role or not, though, the move was very difficult.

Much more than I expected, because the first year or so was deeply isolating and lonely, even though Andrew’s cohort and other friends in the PhD program immediately accepted me as one of their own, making it their new life’s ambition to turn me into a metalhead (one who listens to heavy metal or death metal). I don’t hate it but I’m not replacing Owl City, my Broadway Jams to Belt in the Car playlist, or my 90s nostalgia playlist all at once right away.

That first year was the hardest, and the year I decided to reach back out to my Spiritual Director to see if we could start meeting again. We do, and it’s given me a lot of insight and continually shaped me into a more compassionate and courageous leader.

I was accepted to a Baptist Women in Ministry (BWIM) peer group in 2023, and to the Baptist Women in Ministry Mentoring Cohort in 2025. These two opportunities to form community via Zoom, and some in person helped me build the resilience I needed to emerge from my loneliness cocoon and start thriving.

This year, I joined The Writing Table, a writing community that meets on weekday mornings via Zoom to write together, celebrated the completion of my Doctor of Ministry Degree with a trip to NOLA, I wrote a book!, and I made a new friend named Sarah in Kailin Curtice’s writing group.

Our little apartment began to really start feeling like home somewhere in these three years, and finally even moreso this past weekend after I crafted myself a writing space just for me, using funds from a wellness grant for completing the BWIM Mentoring Program.

And my work has felt more and more like a calling again, with all of those supports in place, and my own commitment to the resilience to find pockets of joy and beauty wherever I find myself.

As I’ve gotten to know my colleagues and support them with a Tea for the Soul staff care initiative, and as I’ve gotten to know the residents and become someone they can trust with the big stuff, and someone with whom they know they will be heard in delight through the small stuff, I am re-energized with creativity and ideas for brainstorming the next however many years I get to be in my dream role, with these beautiful people in this beautiful (albeit at times a bit too hot) place.

I’m grateful to God for all of it, and I had a lovely time celebrating my third anniversary at Eaton. Cheers!

“That’s because Dolly Parton and Tim Curry are dead,” he said.

Well, yeah. That’ll do it I guess. I also was off Friday of last week and a nice chunk of 2 days fully off (since I work on Sundays) was glorious.

Dolly and Tim have been special to me for a long time. I didn’t grow up with them in the background of my childhood, but I grew up with them in the formative years of my teenhood, navigating a transnational move from Brazil to Atlanta, GA, USA.

Growing up in Brazil, our “Dolly” was called Xuxa. My aunt Valerie would record Reading Rainbow, and Sesame Street and Under the Umbrella tree and send the VHS tapes to us, so we got some popular US culture, while being formed in the culture of Brazil with comics like Turma da Monica, and Portuguese-dubbed episodes of The Dinosaurs.

When we moved “back” to the US- I say “back,” because technically Abilene, TX was my first home before my parents and their missionary team moved to Brazil- life was very difficult. I refused to speak to my parents for the better part of a year, a decision that haunts me to this day even though I know that developmentally, it was a way to process an abundance of grief that was accessible to me at the time.

One night, my sister and I were looking for something to watch on TV, after our parents had gone to bed. We stumbled upon a movie featuring some kids playing outside. I also recognized Annette O’Toole, an actress I LOVED in A Girl of the Limberlost. “Let’s watch this!” I enthusiastically requested of my sister and she agreed.

A few moments later, our hearts were pounding out of our chests and we were on the verge of tears when a creepily clowned-up Tim Curry appeared on the screen.

That was my very brief introduction and goodbye to IT.

I plan to read it, and Andrew and I might watch the made for TV mini series tonight. MIGHT.

I didn’t know that was Tim Curry until much later, thank goodness. He became part of my easing into North American life after the IT fiasco, when we had family movie night after I had decided to forgive my parents for uprooting and dragging us across the globe. Muppet Treasure Island was a treasure in our book of family lore, along with Muppet Christmas Carol, the Great Muppet Caper and, most importantly, The Muppets Take Manhattan.

We love the Muppets!

I watched Muppet Treasure Island a lot during those years of trying to figure out how to exist in a culture I barely knew anything about, among foods that were fine for a family reunion on furlough trips from Brazil but failed to measure up to the deliciousness I had grown up eating.

Until one day, in the kitchen when I was probably in 8th grade. I had just watched Steel Magnolias at my best friend Carrie’s house, and I decieded to make Truvy’s (Dolly Parton’s character) Cuppa-Cuppa-Cup dessert.

“Cuppa flour, cuppa sugar, cuppa fruit cocktail with the juice. Then you mix and bake at three hundred and fifty ‘til gold and bubbly.”

I served it over ice cream to cut the sweetness.

Tim and Dolly helped me navigate a little inner world that was falling apart, and helped me put the pieces back together, one eternally quotable line after another, until I finally cobbled something together that looked surviving and thriving, including maturing out of blaming my parents, lifelong besties, creative practices of self-expression, maturing out of hating the move from Brazil to the US because of all the richness of life it gave me, and the impressive ability to quote all of Steel Magnolias, word for word.

Tim and Dolly wove me back together, and I didn’t even know it at the time.

I will always love them for that.

My MawMaw knew all about snow cream. The one time it snowed while we were visiting, she let us get out the fancy root beer glasses to make snow cream floats. Sugar in excess was her way of lavishing love. We’d dip the glasses in water and immediately put them into the freezer. In about an hour when they were good and chilled, she’d send us out with a pan which we would fill with powdery snow.

Once inside with our crystalline treasure, our dad would pour in some milk, a little sugar and some vanilla and gently, GENTLY fold all the ingredients into each other, so as not to bruise the frosty fluff that was the very foundation of our delectable dessert.

The snow cream, thick and rich, would be spooned into the ice cold root beer mugs right away, and topped off with a little of the bubbling sassafras tonic (A&W, of course!).

It was like Christmas in a cup - the ice crystals from the snow cream chilling the root beer into a kind of creamy slush while the glow from the Christmas tree beckoned us to the living room where candy dishes of peanut brittle and soft peppermints waited to be eaten in the haze of family merriment.

There’s not a snow day in my adulthood that has gone by without me fixing myself a bowl of snow cream. Sure, I use splenda now and fat free milk, but the ritual is the same. The care with which I collect the freshly fallen snow, the gentle GENTLE folding together of snow, sugar/splenda, milk and vanilla. The anticipation, and on the rarest fancy occasion, a chilled glass and some root beer.

Theirs was a second-chance love, an opportunity to love and be loved differently than before. She moved into his house in Killen and immediately made it feel like home again, and he and she quickly settled into a routine. Pimento cheese and bologna sandwiches during the week with fresh peaches for dessert, fish fry at the community center on special occasion Fridays (the special occasion being a visit from me), Walsie’s chicken stew on Saturday, and Jim’s buffet after church on Sunday, until Jim had to close his doors for the last time.

College life was good to me, but those weekends of simple living, good southern eating, and becoming something of a pro at cards were total bliss. Walsie worked her way into my heart quickly, with her unintentional hilarious one-liners; a quick wit that could keep up with Pappaw and still manage to be proper and befitting a southern belle.

The time the three of us went to the aquarium was so much fun. That day, we set out to Chattanooga by way of a hundred or so mile yard sale. We went to the aquarium, had lunch and headed back home after a full day of fun and learning. Walsie wasn’t really much for fish - live ones anyway, but she managed ok.

She was hospitality to the core. After Pappaw died, I continued to visit her regularly until just recently when life started piling up. Walking into her home, I could smell the familiar smells of simple living. Waiting for me each time was bread in the cabinet, bologna and pimento cheese in the fridge, and a lemon ice box pie.

The last time I saw Walsie, that I remember anyway, we had a really good time; a packed weekend of visiting folks and playing cards, watching The Gaithers on TV, and shopping the farmer’s market. We came home that Saturday afternoon loaded down with okra (or, okry, if you’re southern), plump and juicy tomatoes, and a big ole mess of field peas. We shelled the day away into the evening before supper, piling field peas into a big pot and watching The Lifetime Movie Network.

I left that Sunday after church with her recipe for fried okra, and her best wishes for a safe trip home. The most important thing I learned from Walsie is the value of family. She worked hard to reconcile differences and bring people together, she introduced me as her granddaughter and I her, as my grandmother.

A very special lady walked among us for eighty-however many years. I’m so glad we crossed paths.

Breakfasts in Brazil are simple affairs; abundant, but simple. Slices of fresh papaya and mango accompany a spread of French baguettes and assorted deli meats and cheeses, guava paste, farmers cheese and coffee. This day’s breakfast was no different, except it was: different in deliciousness and in how it fueled us up for the day. We ate, my parents and I, and with full bellies and excited hearts set off on our quest.

We left the busy city of Belo Horizonte and headed for the rolling hills and cobbled streets of historic Sabará. My parents had seen the ad in the paper and knew they had to jump on it. There were no violin teachers in the area where we lived, nor in the surrounding towns. Instead there were piano teachers.

A week before this magical day, I had heard Bach’s Prelude in C Major on the radio and I was transformed. The music called to me; gripped me in my soul and wouldn’t turn me loose. I’d find myself getting tatted on in school for humming it, daydreamed about the music.

It enraptured me, enchanted me, and hypnotized me into a kind of captivity to the song. My aunt had helped me learn “Swans on the Lake,” and I carried that some with me; my wild card in a bag of party which at that point consisted only of several jokes and a few outlandish stories.

But this, THIS could revolutionize my little life. I needed this song, needed to learn it. When my parents asked if instead of violin lessons which I’d longed for… forever, I would be interested in learning piano, the obvious and enthusiastic answer, was “yes!”

We arrived at a beautiful house, where the family who was preparing to move was waiting, expecting us. They welcomed us in, especially me, treating me like one of the grown ups. I was shown to a room housing the most beautiful piano I’d ever seen. I stood and stared, transfixed.

“Do you like it?” my mom asked. “Yes,” I whispered.

An grandfatherly man looked down at me, ” why don’t you play it, judt to make sure.” I sat down at the bench lengthening my spine to straighten my back as much as I could, and began to play “Swans on the Lake.” Those swans “glided under the willows” like never before, soaring on crisp notes piercing the cool, country air. Disappointingly, the piano wouldn’t be mine, truly at-my-home mine until a few days later. Forever away.

I would wait (im) patiently for it and I, to finally be home.

“I knew from the day I met you that you would need a piano,” my mom said as we drove away. When you were itty bitty, I took your fingers in mine and I said ‘those are piano fingers.’” I smiled and watched the rolling hills and cobbled streets disappear into the distance. As we drove into the setting sun, as if on some magical cue, the radio began to play a soul -reaching rendition of Bach’s Prelude in C and Ave Maria.

I could not be more excited for my book to be out in the world next year. I could not be more terrified for my book to be out in the world next year.

During a writing group recently (hosted by Kaitlin Curtice for paid subscribers to The Liminality Journal, I decided to use the time to journal, just journal for myself, and be myself, for an hour and a half and it was glorious.

My journaling revealed that I needed to acknowledge some griefs that are coexisting alongside the excitement of submitting my completed manuscript and having a publication date.

Because Tehom Center is a small press, marketing is up to me. While Dr. Angela Yarber has made practical, manageable work of creating a marketing plan in her book, The Authorpreneur Handbook: How Writing a Book Can Create an Abundant Life for Marginalized Writers, it’s an intimidating process and a bit overwhelming.

Julia Cameron calls the mean things that creatives tend to let themselves say about themselves “blurts.” My blurts have decided to move in to the corner of my mind that wakes in the night wondering, “What if it’s garbage?” “What if people regret reading it?” “What if the recipes are disgusting?” The blurts make it kind of difficult to thing about pitching companion pieces to publications to bring awareness to the book, or to plan social media content.

Dr. Yarber’s book even includes mental health support ideas to sustain authors through the process of putting a book out into the world. I knew that it would be challenging to navigate the shift in my writing life from working on a project, to releasing it to become what it will become when it (hopefully) comes to rest in your hands and on your coffee tables, bedside tables, and in your suitcases for vacation reads. I didn’t expect the mental health crash to be immediate, or fairly profound.

I realized writing with Kaitlin and one of the most supportive writing communities, that I need to mourn the shift in my writing life, and to grieve the changed relationship between me and my manuscript. Writing out three griefs around the book authoring process, and finishing with three gratitudes about the book authoring process helped me stabilize and re-find my footing.

Grief

1. I am grieving a shift in my writing life that leaves me vulnerable. This project has been with me, in some way, since 2014 or 2015. I am proud of what it’s become. I’m also proud of the journey it represents: profound spiritual formation, my activist origin story, and a deeply embodied quest for identity and belonging as an adoptee trying to find my place in the world.

2. I am grieving the self-doubt that is my new traveling companion on the journey of life. I will need to be incredibly intentional about planning and honoring self care practices, even more than I was already doing.

3. I am grieving the uncertainty of what happens during the launch and on publication day, and beyond. It’s a scary, liminal space to occupy.

Gratitude

1. I am grateful, and looking forward to what happens during the launch and on publication day and beyond; and that I chose the right outfit for my author photoshoot on Saturday. I went back and forth on whether to choose a professional, polished look or be my fullest of full selves. I chose full self, thus, 7 layers of blush pink sparkly tulle (the skirt has stars on it!), a black ruffle-sleeved top, and black knockoff converse.

2. I am grateful for the time freed up from working on this manuscript, to work on poetry and more self reflection.

3. I am grateful for the opportunity to think creatively about what I can offer the marketing process. I’m thinking Cook with Me Zoom events, virtual story circles, virtual group grief coaching because I am a grief coach now, and virtual book clubs).

This is going to be quite the journey. I’m glad you’re along for the ride! One of my favorite self care activities is at home spa night with Andrew, which we did on Saturday, with a spa ambience video playing in the background. I’m also reading more for fun, lately. I just finished Stephen King’s Holly. I’m reading Andrea Gibson’s tremendous poetry collection, Lord of the Butterflies, and listening to The Fall of the House of FIFA.

How are you taking care of you these days?

This is a post from that website (new version coming soon!), written in 2017.

…

When thrown into a fire, magnolia leaves make the best crackle. I learned this during the summer I turned eight. That was the summer I got stung on the head by a yellow jacket. My scalp itched and peeled for weeks.

Summers on the farm were the stuff of life; a time to explore the bluffs. Acres upon acres of forested land beckoned us to come and to be. To be still and silent, listening to the drip, drip, drip of the dew falling off the cow’s hoof trees. To step in rhythm to the whoosh of Mallard creek after a storm and the slow drip of the sulfur springs, buried treasure housing endless delights for two sisters looking for arrowheads and longing to quench their thirst.

Evenings were spent sitting by the bonfire after a hearty meal of country ham steaks and biscuits. Grandaddy and I would pour sorghum syrup on our biscuits. That was our thing; like a secret handshake or a code language that the two of us had mastered. Others dabbled in it, but we were connoisseurs of the sweet and sticky nectar. Grandaddy was like me: a sweet tooth and a mostly quiet spirit.

The fire would crackle and smoke with every magnolia leaf one of us would lay on the flames. Adults making grown-up talk, and the cousins poking at bronze embers glowing angrily, seeing who could make the biggest spark of copper stars go up from the pit toward the heavens.

Eventually, the flames would smolder down. Assured that they would die and cool off in the night, we would head back, my sister and I, to the guest trailer where we would stay on summer furlough to the U.S. Happily sauntering off to eager beds, ready to welcome us with softness, we would see how many tar bubbles we could pop with our feet on the paved country road between Grandaddy’s and the trailer, always on the lookout for rattlesnakes, honey bees and yellow jackets.

Whatever brings you here, I’m glad you are here!

I’m Sara. I’m a director of spiritual care at a senior living community in Lakewood, CO, and I also pastor the church that meets onsite. I love my work, and I prioritize my off-work.

When I’m not working, I like to rewatch my favorite comfort shows. Right now, it’s Glee. I have a cat named ReeseeMuffin, and we call her Muff. She acts like we are not best friends, but I can see right through her. She misses me when I’m gone and when I wake up in the morning, she’s fast asleep on my pillow right next to me. We are so best friends.

I’m married to Andrew, who is a PhD student in religious studies in the Joint Doctoral Program (JDP) at the University of Denver and Iliff School of Theology. Our favorite things lately are day trips to Boulder, getting Chicken Salad Chick and going to the Tattered Cover bookstore in Littleton, and spending time at the Denver Central Library, which we will be doing on Wednesday, my day off, because we got the dreaded “we are mad at you, please return your books” letters from the Denver Public Library yesterday. Oopsies.

This Substack used to be called Embodied Belonging. I changed it to Embodied Resistance, because of the tremendous amount of work to do to bring about a world where everyone belongs. Things like the genocide in Gaza and the humanitarian crises in Congo and Sudan, famines and conflicts across the globe serve as a piercing reminder that we need to remember our interconnection: to one another, to the only earth we have to live on. I’m still finding my version of embodied resistance, and I am grateful that you’ve come along for the ride.

These are some of the core beliefs I keep close to my heart as I navigate my little corner of the world:

Black lives matter

Trans rights are human rights

Housing is a human right

Abolish ICE

Everyone is worthy of dignity and respect

Free Palestine

No one is illegal on stolen land

No human is illegal, period

Believe women

Believe Black women

Pay artists

AI “art” is not art

You are loved

And finally, an update and a gift, for all of you.

I wrote a book! Embodied Belonging: Culinary and Theological Reflections on Race, Identity, and Belonging is due out in July, 2027. For full transparency, because I deeply appreciate other authors for their vulnerability throughout their processes, I’ve entered the “what if it’s garbage stage?” of putting a book out into the world.

My mind wakes me in the night with “what if the recipes suck?” “what if people hate it?” “what if it’s terrible?” “what if people don’t like the recipes or the stories?” I know it’s part of the process. I think it’s good, and I genuinely hope you will get a chance to read it, and I hope you like it.

In the meantime, my writing playlist helps me stay inspired, grounded, and not too serious all the time.

I typed it up for you, in case you’d like to have a listen! You can view it here.

Thank you for being here. I love to read your comments and hear your stories. Tell me, what is your favorite way to create community wherever you are?

I might have mentioned it before, but I did have a “garden,” when I was about 6 or 7 years old.

Our house in Brazil had a remarkable outdoor area where my sister’s guinea pig and my bunny lived in a huge cage, and there was a guava tree and a Brazilian version of a muscadine tree, and a large garden.

My parents cleared out a little section for me in the corner of the garden, after I read the book, The Secret Garden, and became obsessed with gardens and gardening, even though as we know, I am terrible at it.

I went to my mom, just like Mary in the secret garden when she goes to Mr. Craven to ask for a patch of earth to garden in,

and I said to my mom, like a giant nerd, in an English accent because that’s how Mary talks in the Secret Garden movie, “might I have a bit of earth?”

So, after laughing at me, my parents gave me a bit of earth in a corner of our garden where I planted radishes. Just radishes. I love radishes.

Every day, I would go check on them, disgusted with how long they were taking to grow.

Finally, as soon as the first tender leaves emerged, I ran out to pull them all up and harvest my radishes. I didn’t understand that you have to wait patiently for the roots to get strong so they can support a radish and feed it so it grows nice and round.

When my parents explained to me that I would have to wait several WEEKS to see a harvest, I quickly lost interest in gardening; at least until much later in life.

Had I patiently waited for the radishes to grow, nestled gently in the warm earth, I would have had a bountiful basketful of delicious radishes to use in salads, sandwiches, and to share with the neighbors.

It would have been quite a representation of God’s nurturing of all of God’s creation, even down to a little radish seed, of God’s love for all humanity demonstrated in sharing from the bounty of the garden, of God’s patience with us as we try to understand the teachings of Christ and and model our lives after him.

A vibrant, colorful, tasty reminder of the ways the kingdom of God is always among us.

And yet, in fact, the lessons learned in impatience, even at a young age, can offer tangible reminders of the value of taking the time to care for something, to tend it and watch it flourish, as God and God’s spirit tend to us; reminders that the kingdom of God is always among us.

Please join me in prayer.

Holy God, may the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts together be pleasing in your sight o Lord, our rock and our redeemer.

Not only is Jesus a shining example of how to love even when it’s difficult or uncomfortable, and a wonderful teacher, he is also a pretty funny guy! You kind of have to be on the inside of ancient agricultural customs to get the joke, so let’s dive in.

At this time in Jesus’ ministry, agriculture is a common and pretty lucrative way of life for many of Jesus’ hearers. He knows that, so when he describes what the kingdom of God could be described as, he reaches for parables and metaphors that will make sense to his audience.

The kingdom of God is like a garden. The gardener has nestled seeds carefully in the earth and now has to trust that the seed will know what to do. God will send rain, and sun to the garden, and love the garden.

Worms will find a home there and fertilize the dirt, and the seed will unfurl and send its roots down deep into the soil. The gardener can do nothing but trust the seed to do its thing, the rain and the sun, and the worms to do their thing,

and eventually, if the gardener is patient and doesn’t dig up all the plants to see if there’s a radish on the other end of the tender greens shooting up from earth, there will be a harvest - a bounty of produce to be shared and enjoyed.

Makes sense, right? Jesus goes on, with one more parable because he wants to make sure the point is taken.

The kin-dom of God, he says, is like a mustard seed. The very smallest of all the seeds on earth, which grows to become the greatest shrub of all time, with large branches that extend up and out so that birds might nest in its branches.

Sounds lovely, right? Maybe for the birds. But not for the gardeners among Jesus’ listeners that day. Picture them and their puzzled-looking faces.

“Mustard? Really, Jesus? Mustard? Do you know about mustard? It invades the whole garden, growing up and out and forward and backward.

If we were to put even one mustard seed in any of our gardens, our harvest would be ruined - either by the mustard’s roots choking out the other roots, or wild birds coming to nest in the mustard plant, destroying the harvest by picking away at the choice fruits.

There are so many ways you could have gone with that. You could have said the kin-dom of God is like the cedars of Lebanon - magnificent, towering, majestic and beautiful. Why would you liken the reign of God in the world to a common, invasive garden weed?”

It would be like if Jesus came to the local garden club and said the kin-dom of God is so magnificent, loving, and wonderful, it is like a creeping thistle right in the middle of your garden, making beautiful flowers, towering high above all the other plants.

While a creeping thistle flower is actually quite pretty, the plant itself is kind of a diva. It saps the soil of essential nutrients, using them all to help itself grow and eventually it crowds out other plants.

It also requires a lot of water to survive, so every time a garden overrun with creeping thistle is watered, the water is almost immediately soaked up by this horrible plant, drying out the soil so that other plants don’t have much of a chance to survive.

Not very awe-inspiring.

But, maybe that is Jesus’ point. The kin-dom of God isn’t meant to be awe-inspiring, or beautiful, or majestic, or anything that is purely aesthetically pleasing.

It is earthy, pervasive, sturdy, and while it might be an eyesore for people who don’t understand it, it is a welcome sight for people who need it.

So, what would we say the kin-dom of God is like?

The kin-dom of God is unglamorous. The smallest mustard seed doesn’t look like it has much potential, but it grows, rampant, in any garden in which it is planted, overtaking the garden and displacing other plants.

Sometimes, the kingdom of God, the way of Christ, needs to permeate spaces that are filled with the harvest of hate, overrunning them, choking them out, to make space for welcome and love.

A place where people can find shelter in the welcoming arms of Christ, and the deep, deep love of God.

The kin-dom of God is rich in hospitality. As mustard continues to grow, it becomes a sturdy shrub with branches strong enough for birds to nest in.

Animals find shelter from sun and heat, and can rest in the shade of the mustard shrub, fending off exhaustion.

Christ-followers who take his example seriously, who grow in love and hospitality, like mustard plants, become sturdy havens where weary travelers on the road of life can find compassion, a listening ear, understanding, and welcome.

The kin-dom of God is about shalom. Shalom is a Hebrew word which generally translates to wholeness, or complete well-being. Shalom also connotes spiritual healing.

Mustard in Jesus’ day, was a prized medicinal plant, known for its healing properties.

Followers of Christ who are working to bring the kin-dom of God to earth, who are working to embody the way of Christ in our daily lives become spiritual healers to fellow travelers on the road of life.

Jesus isn’t being flippant when he compares the kin-dom of God to a mustard seed; he’s not just trying to get a rise out of people who would be put off by the image of the kin-dom of God as a shrub rather than a great cedar.

He is trying to convey the message that the kin-dom of God, the reign of God’s love where all are invited into God’s boundless grace and love, is a shock to the system, a shift in perspective so powerful that, like a mustard plant, is nearly impossible to eradicate.

When the kin-dom of God takes hold of our lives, our churches, it transforms our way of being, our perceptions and perspectives.

It changes the way we exist in the world, shaping us into healing reminders of the presence of God in the world; sturdy havens of the welcoming and all-encompassing love of Christ, and a safe place for people who are looking for a place to belong.

And through the power of a mustard seed, the lonely find a place to belong in the loving arms of Christ, Christ-followers find purpose and meaning in spreading that love to the world around us.

The mustard shrub of God’s love is sturdy enough to hold our griefs and gratitudes, and reminds us of one of the images of God as a loving father. Branches stretch out like arms, ready to embrace us with abiding love.

My mom is an avid gardener, even though she has lupus that limits her mobility and ability to get down in front of a garden bed. She does what she can, and my dad does the rest - seeding, weeding the hard to reach areas of their magnificent backyard bird sanctuary.

Her biggest pet peeve of gardening is non-native, invasive plants. They threaten entire ecosystems, and destabilize local produce and flowers. Like mustard, they threaten the beauty of the plants already planted, that are trying to thrive.

Sometimes the kingdom of God is like that. Where there are long-held beliefs about humanity: who is worthy of being treated with dignity and respect, who is out and who is in when it comes to faith, what the color of a person’s skin, or their immigration status says about their worth as a person, or judgments about the various expressions and iterations of love in relationships,

the mustard seed of God’s topsy- turvy kin-dom where the first will be last and the last will be first, nestles itself deep in the earth, unfurls in the safety of the soil, send its roots way down deep, and begins to grow - choking out beliefs and judgments that miss the spirit of the Gospel of Christ.

The kin-dom of God invites us to consider that rather than a tremendous cedar towering high in homage to a magnificent king, we might just prefer being mustard shrubs, with branches all over the place which offer shelter and safety to all who would come and seek to belong in the kin-dom of God, pointing to a carpenter from Nazareth, to show us the way.

Please join me in prayer.

Holy God,

Make us mustard shrubs in a world that needs the safety of our branches to provide rest and comfort, and glimpses of your love and welcome for all of your people.

We are grateful for your presence in our lives, for grace and forgiveness, for repentance and opportunities to try again, each day, to live as people of your kin-dom here on earth.

Remind us when we forget, that you are with us, that you are always among us, always inviting us into your loving work in the world.

Through Christ our Lord we pray, Amen.

And yet, there are pockets of joy to be found, grasped and clinged to.

Lately, my pockets of joy have been found in simplicity, generous gifts of affirmation, and trying a popular Tik Tok trend.

Andrew says my catch phrase is “I saw it on Tik Tok” because almost every recipe I try these days is likely to be something I saw on Tik Tok. Food Tok, as some people call it.

The trend is called wet chips and I’m here to tell you, you can do worse for dinner. Here’s my version:

Put some potato chips in a bowl. Add some tinned fish of your choice. I of course did this dinner twice in a row (don’t do more than that in a week probably). The first time I used Fishwife spicy albacore tuna, the second time I used Fishwife smoked salmon.

Low waste tip: Save the oil from your tinned fish, for scrambles or for infusing the oil you use to fry potatoes and onions for a Spanish tortilla with an unbeatable zip of flavor.

After draining your fish and reserving your oil, add some Kewpie mayo, and whatever else you like! I did green olives, pickled red onion, and salmon roe. Capers would have put the whole thing absolutely over the top.

Once you’re please with your add-ins, mix it up and enjoy. Look, I know it sounds weird, it will probably look weird, and if you’re a texture person, just do the mix ins and mayo then use the chips as a dip. But I’m telling you, it’s worth a try.

I didn’t think I was a texture person, but as it turns out, I cannot do the protein powder mixed with yogurt trend.

Moving on.

I’ve submitted a total of 5 poems for consideration for publication. One was for a contest, and 4 were for the general poems category of a poetry magazine, and that is a pocket of joy because I’m challenging myself to something new.

I was also notified that as part of the mentoring cohort I was able to participate in from January of 2025 through June of 2026 with Baptist Women in Ministry, that I will receive the clergy wellness grant I applied for after completing the program. In my proposal for the use of these grant funds, I decided that I will create an inviting writing space in our little apartment, just for me. Anything left from the purchase of furnishings for my writing space and a supply of my favorite pen: Pentel Hybrid Technica, .5mm, will be used to offset a few more poetry and creative nonfiction contest fees, cover a Kaitlin Curtice writing workshop, and help offset the membership cost of my morning writing group which meets M-F via Zoom.

Finally, with an AMC gift care, Andrew and I will go to a movie this weekend which hasn’t happened in a very long time, and help a new friend move to Denver.

Amidst the horrors, there is joy that persists, alongside fundamental truths that also persist:

Black lives matter

Trans rights are human rights

Housing is a human right

Abolish ICE

Everyone is worthy of dignity and respect

Free Palestine

No one is illegal on stolen land

No human is illegal, period

Believe women

Pay artists

You are loved

Peace,

-Sarita -

Shout out to the people who haven’t minimized my World Cup griefs, like family and friends.

Honorable mention to the staff chaplain at the hospital where I did my chaplain residency, who came to check on me and sit for a little while, when Germany scored on Brazil 3 times in however many minutes at the start of their 2014 semi-final throwdown, and my friend Scott who texted his wife, my seminary bestie, Emily on December 9, 2022, that “you might want to check on Sara, Croatia just scored again,” during the quarter finals match between Brasil and Croatia which ultimately ended in a 4-1 win for Croatia.

Croatia became my team for the rest of that tournament, just as Norway is now mine for this one.

Tomorrow is my day off. I’m grateful because I plan to spend part of the day doing some summer decluttering, and part of it languishing in observance of an anniversary that shouldn’t mean this much to me but it does.

Brasil’s loss to Germany (a** whipping by Germany, more like?) on July 8, 2014 and the subsequent emotional crash feel closer to me this year, because I just witnessed the men’s Brazilian national team embarrass themselves yet again in another World Cup and I am tired.

And it may not make sense, but when you are raised in a country that lives and breathes football, where schools and companies alter their operating schedules so students and employees can watch World Cup or Copa America matches, the investment in the sport burrows down deep and even after moving away, never goes away. To my body and my embodied soul, it makes perfect sense.

What I grew up watching was a vibrant, happy, jubilant, rhythmic, embodied version of football. A dance-like version, called futebol de samba. Samba football. The game was a dance. And it was beautiful to watch. And being a fan of national and club teams was about more than just liking the game, it was about the way that fans become family in an instant.

It is embodied, it is meaningful, and hopeful and beautiful. And a royal pain to carry ever since 2014… and 2018, when we were all sure Brasil would avenge their loss and redeem some of their humiliation, the plan for the last day of my bachelorette party weekend was going to be watching a Brasil vs. Whomever final at Taco Mac in downtown Decatur, GA (a suburb of Atlanta). Not so. We went to Waffle House then parted ways.

This past Sunday promised to be such a good day. We had a good worship service, AND found a seat at the little Brazilian bakery where we like to have breakfast on the rare occasion. We got lunch, and sat and ate and watched the pre-coverage for an hour before the game started and watched the cafe fill with people and palpable energy.

To this day, I know every single word of the Brazilian national anthem. That’s right, both 18-line stanzas live in my heart. I sing it three times before a match. The deep joy of singing it along with all the other Brazilians gathered together to watch what we all were hoping was a resurgence, finally, of futebol de samba, is indescribable. Even Andrew’s listened along with me, participating in this specific neurosis for enough years that he was able to sing along with a lot of it too. How cool is that?!

We sang as one, each line of the first stanza getting louder and louder, until the last part of the first chorus, “patria amada Brazil (beloved country, Brazil). The energy in the room shifted when Agnolotti or whatever his name is finally put Endrick in play. Too little, too late, pal. But, the decision was met with loud cheers, offering a fresh infusion of hope.

The room erupted with even more cheers and applause (not from either of us) when Neymar began warming up to take to the pitch. I knew as soon as he stepped into the game, that we were done for.

But I clung to my hope, even still, as Vinny “I’m the new star of this sport because I did an ad for Air Pods and can make this goal all by myself,” Jr. kept creating and missing chances while continuing to follow the same pattern, without passing.

And I clung to my hope, still, as Endrick, who should have seen more playing time even before this match, struggled to do his best at converting any of his chances into goals. Sorry, I mean GOOOOOOOOOOOLs.

We left after Norway’s 3rd goooooooool, and didn’t see Neymar’s successful penalty shot. At that point we kind of knew we were sunk, given the pattern of failing to convert chances we had already watched close to 90 minutes of.

I’ve seen a lot of nostalgia posts from Brazilians about missing the team from the 1994 Men’s World Cup, and I get it. And from my perspective as a grief support professional and recently certified holistic grief care practitioner, I think there’s a deep-rooted, multicausal reason for this.

First, the 1994, and even the 1998 and 2002 teams were bringers of that playful, rhythmic, beautiful game we all know and love. Samba football is fun to watch because the players are having fun, too. In 2014 when that style of football died, some part of the magical spark infusing Brasilian football to that point also died, and neither the team nor its supporters have ever fully recovered.

The circumstances leading to that match between Brasil and Germany on July 8, 2014, granted, were significant. The pressure to win at home put a damper on the fun they were able to have while playing the game.

Whereas the teams of previous cups were cohesive and tight-knit, the Brazilian national men’s team of 2014 couldn’t formulate a team strategy that worked for each of the star members of the squad (Thiago Silva, Neymar, Jr., and David Luiz).

Super star mentality and ego had them barely eking out a victory against James Rodriguez’ Chile, and would move them on to the most humiliating defeat in Brazilian history.

Since then, I don’t know what kind of grief work each national squad has done together, or even if that is something that happens, but if so, it hasn’t been enough.

Between BRA GER 2014 and the Covid-19 pandemic of the early 2020s, Brasil has carried a lot of collective grief, and maybe in the next few years before the Women’s World Cup in 2027, the Copa America in 2028, and the 2030 Men’s World Cup, those griefs can be tended, and the dance can begin again.

World Cup eliminations and “last cups” for childhood/early adulthood heroes are a form of disenfranchised grief.

I think that the eliminations in this men’s World Cup, of course of the big name teams, but especially the underdogs, and the retirements of global stars many of us feel like we grew up with, or came into early adulthood with (Ronaldo, Neymar, Modric, Memo, and others), feel the end of an era, and those of us who are having big feelings have to figure out what we are going to do with our own disenfranchised grief.

What I’m going to do is my regularly scheduled therapy, some journaling, some decluttering, some edits to my manuscript before sending to my publisher… and perhaps a little more Brazilian food just for the embodied nostalgia.

As much as I’ve been underwhelmed recently with Neymar, he’s been the embodiment of futebol de samba since 2014, at least to me, and I will miss the footwork that at one time took the world by storm, and the sheer look of joy and fun as he played.

Thanks to Neymar, Modric, Ochoa, even CR 7, for one last dance. It’s been a pleasure to witness.

The World Cup is one of those embodied memories for me.

I grew up in Brazil. My parents were missionaries there on a team, and I lived there from ages one to eleven. Those were great years. I experienced so much in the short start to my life: really good food, friendship building, learning piano, and a self discovery. There’s a personality trait which I have, that only comes out in during the World Cup (though Andrew will tell you it is subtly always in the background of my life). I have no idea how it was formed, but I can pinpoint two early experiences of this deeply competitive spirit.

One was around third of fourth grade, when I, my piano school classmates and my music teachers learned, together, that I can play by ear. Once that discovery was made, when my teacher would play us a pretty song and the next day, I would be in the studio early, working out my own arrangement of it, the girls in my class started being mean to me.

I was out for revenge, but my mom told me that in the Bible, there’s a passage about not getting revenge, but instead being nice to your enemies because it would be like heaping burning coals on their head.

Genius! I thought. So, I ignored their passive aggressive meanness, but not without having a little fun of my own, stoking the fire of those burning coals, by continuing to “by ear” many of the songs our teachers would play for us, to motivate continued study so we could learn them one day.

The other, was one of the early matches of World Cup 1994, when I was sent to the corner (where I spent a significant amount of time in my childhood) on my BIRTHDAY of all things, because my mom had overheard me talking smack about the team who would be playing Brazil later that day. I was asked to think about being kind with my words, instead of using them to be unkind. “It’s ok to want to win,” my mom said, “but it’s not ok to say ‘I hope they are jet lagged and have a terrible match. You have to be kind.”

Moms, am I right?

I understood. Still, World Cup Sara when one of my teams is playing (Brazil, Mexico, US) is not an iteration of myself that I’m always proud of. Because I have a competitive spark that is ignited when I watch. And sometimes I wonder if it is all about winning, or if it is because my mind, my soul, is trying to hang onto something. I think so, and I think that something is embodied nostalgia.

World Cup ‘94 was the last majorly fun thing I remember from that year. The rest of it was spent preparing for a permanent move to the US.

I wrote in my Morning Pages today that “I remember World Cup 1994 so vividly, that I wonder sometimes what else, if anything, was happening around that time.” A big else was happening, actually. We moved away.

My birthday party that year was a World Cup party. When I was released from exile in the corner, I got to gather with my friends and watch the match, then we had birthday cake. It was a sheet cake decorated like the pitch, with figurines of the Brazilian team in formation.

We watched the games at home as a family, my sister and I painting our faces with water color paints to show our support. Our home TV was small, but the Rohr’s had a really big TV, so they had us over for a watch party for the Brazil v US game in the round of 16. The grown-ups got the big TV and cheered for the US. The kids were sent to another room to watch and cheer for Brazil, on a smaller screen TV.

The kids’ room was filled with joy when the Brazil team would score. The adults were probably in the living room planning their big speeches on good sportsmanship. No one got a speech, though, because a tragedy happened. After the match, we were all dispersed to our homes and our rooms, to process.

A US player had taken Leonardo by the arms, to prevent him from getting the ball and as he tried to wrench free by twisting back and forth, he inadvertently broke the US player’s nose with his elbow, in one of the twists to break free.

He was red carded immediately and benched for the rest of the tournament.

The next big watch party would be the Final. We watched with a big group at church. It was neck and neck through the whole game, and through the penalty shoot-out. The stress in the room was as thick as sorghum molasses, a sweet treat I had just learned about at Grandaddy’s house on our most recent visit to the US. Perfect with pancakes, cornbread, or on big, fluffy biscuits.

People were forgetting to breathe, whispering prayers, holding hands as each team made or missed their goals. Finally, it was time for the last player. Italy was out of shooters, and the match was tied. This.Was.It.

Branco was up. Not our best, but not our worst. He raised his foot to strike, and waved it to the right, not touching the ball. The goalie bought the fake-out and dove to the right. While he was down, Branco struck the ball into the net, to the left, and with that Brazil became a 4-time World Cup winner.

World Cup 1994 is one of the corest of my core memories. I reach for it often when I want to remember joy, community, togetherness, and a really good last bit of time in Brazil as a family before we moved away. Every Cup since then teaches me a little more about interconnectedness, and that, beyond core memories that sustain, is a gift that I hope will live on for years to come.

Maw-Maw-s Lipstick

Ma-Maw died when I was in ninth grade, from a brain tumor. I remember it was ninth grade because we were reading Death be Not Proud, by John Gunther. The week we discussed Johnny’s death from a similar brain tumor to Maw-Maw’s was the week that she died. I despise that book to this day. I realize this is wildly unfair.

I asked if I could keep her lipstick and she said yes, I could have whatever I wanted. I wanted her to stay.

Maw-Maw’s lipstick was a creamy plum, Avon or Mary Kay, I don’t remember. I wish I could. I think it was Avon because it made my lips itch.

My sister and I put it in our dress up box for safe keeping. We would put it on in the bathroom mirror in our home, like we had when we were younger, at Maw-Maw’s house, where life really was “simply marvelous” eating her mac and cheese, making root beer floats in frozen glass tankards, and watching TV together until it was time for her “program.”

“Like sand through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives,” and so must little girls go play outside while Maw-Maw watches her program.

There was nothing “simply marvelous,” about Maw-Maw’s death for me, but her life was an exquisite spoil of elegance, gentleness and love, embodied in delicious meals and gifts of creamy plum Avon lipstick.

Moss

Some days I long to go back to the simplicity of childhood, when a good day was defined by discovery.

An interesting patch of moss on a piece of bark enveloping a favorite tree. Intricate webs of green beckoned me to imagine and entire world with their soft folds and immerse myself in it.

Delightful discoveries still await me now, at forty-three, just as much as at sixteen. The reminder invites me to slow down and look for the delights with the eyes of a child hunting for moss.

Shelling Peas

The snap of a field pea is my favorite sound in the world, its grassy aroma misting the air around me, my favorite scent. In an instant, I’m transported to my step-grandmother’s living room

the plush green couch

the melamine bowl between us collecting the little pods of flavor emerging from their protective casings

the smell of grassy field pea snap mist, cornbread baking, and collards simmering fills the air around us

as she yells at the TV screen: “Get away from there, you idiot!” at the clueless character in the Saturday’s Lifetime movie, whose neighbor is about to kill her.

This week, where I am finding stillness is on retreat with a group of women, courtesy of the Baptist Women in Ministry Mentoring Program. Yesterday I made a brunch of chilaquiles with eggs, and refried beans for the group. And I found stillness in the sizzle of corn tortilla strips in a pan, in the simmer of my homemade sauce on the back burner, and in the act of baking Sara’s Chilaquiles, a casserole -style situation with eggs cracked into wells in the surface of the dish. Delicious.

We are at a rental house on a lake in Portland, Maine. Yesterday afternoon was spent on the lake all together. I always loved going to my grandparents’ lake house. The lake shed was my favorite because the smell of plastic worms, WD-40, and musty “lake house smell” was always a comfort to me. Walking into the lake shed calmed me immediately. Enveloped in a life vest, canoe oars in hand, I was ready for each next adventure.

Yesterday was a little different and I’m not sure why. I got in the water, floating on an inner tube, which is my favorite thing. I always loved floating down the Chattahoochee when I lived in Atlanta, on a lazy Saturday afternoon. But yesterday, the farther I drifted from the dock, the more anxious and unsettled I felt.

I had moments of drifting into stillness, then coming back to where I was , how untethered I was to anything, and I felt a deep sink in my stomach and a fear I haven’t felt before on the water. Maybe it was being in an unfamiliar space. I know how to swim, so if I had ended up drifting somewhere really far away, I could have easily swum back to the dock.

I could have hopped off the floaty tube, away from the uncontrolled state of just being there in the water, and grounded my feet on the rocks at the bottom of the lake. I wasn’t ever in any real danger.

In fact, I was completely held. On and by the inner tube, on and by the water.

I used to be braver. I think I mean that I was never the bravest one in any bunch but I did ok. More than wonder at being in the water, staring up at a vast expanse of blue, cloudless sky, I felt fear. I used to be braver, was my thought sitting on the dock after my time in the water.

But I am brave. I got in, I stayed in, and pockets of nostalgia for my Paw Paw’s lake house held me, along with the water.

As I was floating in a moment of peace, and stillness, having forgotten that I wasn’t tethered to anything, staring up at the sky - not a cloud in sight - just pristine blue to match the water below, a dragonfly lighted on my ankle.

Hi, Evinrude, I said, remembering the time (or times) I had watched Disney’s The Rescuers with my dad. Ever since our first watch together, every time he saw, or sees, a dragonfly, he names it Evinrude.

The nostalgia of the moment allowed me to stay in the water just a little longer, then longer still, until it was time to get out and sit on the dock in the sun, talking with an amazing group of women in various ministry roles - belly laughs abundant - wiling away the morning hours until it was time to go explore a lighthouse. Not a bad way to spend a day.

A lazy day at the lake

I sit on an inner tube in the water

untethered

The dock gets further away from me

I am aftraid

“You’re grown and you can swim,” I say to myself

and my mind and body conspire together

always in cahoots, those two, to embody their truth.

It’s different from my truth.

I am grown woman on an inner tube on a lake barely lapping with tiny waves.

No, I am eleven and in a canoe drifting farther away from the pier

my canoe is safely tethered to

calling for help before I get lost at sea.

Minds and bodies remember.

My mind remembers that mom needs a lot of rest and Paw Paw’s lake house

is a distraction from ceasless worry.

Minds and bodies remember.

My body remembers feeling untethered

in the water, in my mind, in my own life

swirling out of control.

Minds and bodies remember.

My mind and body remember that surrendering control

and leaning into the untethered uncertainty of life itself

is the path to healing, the path to wholeness,

the tether to an adventure that awaits

a heart, a mind, a body

that is ready to simply say “yes.”

I came to poetry writing later in life, but I’ve been comparing myself to others, my writing, my music, my “progress” to others’ for an entire lifetime. A popular adage proposes comparison as the thief of joy. While I agree, I don’t think the sentiment goes far enough.

Comparison is a thief of life, of creativity, of the soul.

I feel my soul crushing and threatening to shatter when I compare my writing journey to someone else’s. That’s unfair of me, to me, and unfair to them because a writing journey - any journey - is a unique experience to each individual. How dare I take something so intimate and intricately special from someone else? How dare I take it from myself?

So, I plan to lean into the journey. To celebrate the journeys of other writers and poets even as I celebrate my own, to keep reveling in the beauty of words, the movement of poems that inspire and challenge me, and to be grateful for this time I have to build a writing life and see where it takes me, giving thanks, particularly, for the people and the words I have met along the way.

See? I don’t know where that came from except I just started writing after stating to my Morning Pages, as I often lament to my journal “I don’t think I have a poem in me today,” and this is what bubbled up.

“Bubbling up” is the language of poetry and spiritual direction and pastoral care and…

I don’t hate that. I’m simply grateful today: for the words that found me on the page, for a calling and a congregation to lead, for work from home tomorrow and for laundry machines, and for a kitty whose eccentricities are so overwhelmingly mysterious to me that there’s no other option but to find them adorably endearing.

Cheers.

Sometimes I wish I could return to the good old days. We used to say that sometimes around the dinner table, “remember that time...? Those were the good old days.” And my dad would clear his throat, exaggeratedly, comedically and say “ THESE are the good old days!”

And he was right, the memories we made and the resilience we built through leaning in to both scarcity and abundance, finding joy amidst pockets of pain became the good old days we would inevitably one day with to return to.

And each time, in keeping with the rhythms of life, we would wish for a return and be reminded that we were here, now, making our own good old days together.

Sometimes I wish I could return to the good old days. Then, with a smile, I remember my dad’s advice to be more present in the current moment than in past remembrance. “Ahem, THESE are the good old days.”

Ancestor

Betty Jean Lifton theorized that adoptees create made-up worlds in which they can “meet” their birth families, imagine their way into connection with their blood lines. She called these worlds “ghost kingdoms.”

I never had a ghost kingdom growing up.

I had a stuffed monkey named Smirnish - a child’s attempt at “Spanish,” perhaps.

I had a forever family and a birth family, and lots of books about love and families.

I had a baking set - a favorite birthday gift from my sister.

I came to ghost kingdoms later in life, when I started cooking to process grief:

Mexican dishes for my birth heritage

Southern American dishes passed on through generations of my family’s culinary history

Brazilian dishes for my cultural upbringing as a missionary kid

My ghost kingdom is my kitchen, where grandmothers and great aunts and would-have-been tias and abuelas join me in spirit and we all commune together.

My ancestor is a cactus paddle: a verdant love letter, an invitation to slow down and savor simplicity.

My ancestor is a blackberry bush: laden with juicy fruit to be enjoyed by cousins in a cobbler with homemade ice cream.

My ancestor is a cup of espresso: sticky with sugar, a syrupy sweet, indulgent treat and a reminder of simpler times.

My ghost kingdom is a family reunion in my kitchen: all my ancestors, real and imagined, and the bounty of the earth all communing together.

Recover

I’m in a season of recovery.

Recovering nostalgia through memories of summers on my grandparents’ farm.

The memories are as close as my next breath, these days.

Recovering taste memories in remembering my grandmothers and great aunts in the kitchen.

Their voices are as near as if they were right here, these days.

Plastic worms

the musty lake house shed

banana bread

chocolate meringue pie

old books

rained-on asphalt

These are the smells of recovery, these days.

Voice

My voice is slowly disappearing into life circumstances. I’d really like to get it back.

Voice II

I always hated the sound of my speaking voice… until I learned to preach.

…

I missed a few days, but I’ve mostly stuck with this new daily poetry practice.

And as I’ve kept the practice going, here are two I wrote the other day, following the memories of my Grandmother giving me a lavender sachet to remember her while in Brazil where I grew up as a missionary kid, and my Grandaddy’s picture with a barred owl.

Lavender Air

Grandmother smelled like lavender dusting powder and old books. To this day, the embodied nostalgia of a cup of tea in the early morning evokes the days of sitting on the porch with Grandmother, drinking tea and watching Puff the Cat sunbathe himself into a blissful stupor.

Lavender air kisses my face on the tail end of the gentlest breeze - perhaps a hug from Grandmother from some mystical place. She’s still here Still holding space for tea and the scents of a lazy summer.

And somewhere in the ether, Puff the Cat is still sunbathing his little freeloading haunches off, nestled in a bed of clover and ruffled every now and then by a lavender breeze.

An Owl and A Gentleman

A dusty picture album at the hold homeplace / houses a picture of Grandaddy holding a barred owl / gently by the wingtips / he shows the waiting world / a moment of thinness.

A thin place / where the human meets the divine / and neither are separate / for both have become sacred.

My love for grandaddy is as close as my next breath / and as near as the next task / on my to-do list / this memory visits often.

A moment this sacred requires a pause / a gentle resistance to the lists of to dos / which will surely find me / tomorrow.

…

I’m working on a collection to submit to a contest for older debut female poets (women over 40), which I’m really jazzed about! I’m excited about the process of writing, revising, selecting, and submitting: a sacred rhythm of life in its own way, I guess. The sacred rhythm of a writing life. I like that.