Questions some mom asked her kids

Here is where I ask myself the same questions.

What is the meaning of life?  knowing and being known, giving and receiving love
What do you want to be when you grow up?  a low-powered executive/mom/ballerina
What brings you the most happiness? getting flowers from dogs that bite me
When do you feel the most loved?  see above
What are you afraid of? see above
If you had one wish, what would you wish for? see above
What is the funniest word? sacapuntas (it's spanish, look it up)
What is the hardest/easiest thing to do? wake up
What is the best/worst thing in the world? see above
What makes you mad? see above
What is the meaning of love? the trinity
If you had all the money in the world, what would you do with it? redistribute

The planning.

For the guy who reads this blog.  And all the rest of you.

I am hungry.  My stomach is hungry. 

My face and neck are sunburned, but sometimes I feel it on my shoulders... which didn't see a lick of sun.

The leaves are shiny green and matte red.

I worked on an introduction to my talk for Sunday over lunch at Starbucks.  It just happened as I was reading Henri Nouwen that I wanted to start writing about it.  I was okay with what came out, and in fact, was immediately happy to have written it. 

It came out like grace.  However, my stomach just tied a little knot of anxiety thinking about piecing together the psalm sections and deciding which translation or song or paraphrase fits best... and then timing them all... oh my.  Anxiety, begone!  It will be what it will be, thank God.

The fire is under the cauldron.  The pot is being stirred.  The fragrance is wafting.  The host is preparing, the guest is being prepared.  Ready the feast!

the best day of my life

...was yesterday... or perhaps tomorrow?  Anyway, it was when I was three, and it was my birthday, and we went to the zoo.  I don't remember a lick of it, but I hear it was fun, fun, fun.

The best day of my life is yet to come: when I am sitting in my summer skin, just outside, eating apricots and really liking salad for the fifth time in my life.  Mostly it has to do with my body, this good day, and how it feels and what it has learned to accomplish and how it's stuck with me and supported me all these years, to my surprise. 

Honorable mentions:

Listening to Chris Thile play the mandolin, with a most lovely friend sitting by my side.

Bluegrass festivals and hot bbq pork sandwiches.  Magical fallen trees over the water.  Campfire breakfasts. 

The Upper Peninsula of Michigan, the Point, Narnia, The Dawn Treader.

Watching sunsets from my window.  Any window.

Christmas vacation mornings at my parents' house.

That day in a beach town in Mexico where I ate good food literally all day long and into the evening with great friends. 

X-Country

No, I never was in cross country in high school.  One season of track was all I could manage, and enough to know what I didn't want.  I've never crossed the country from front to back, but there was that north-south trip I did a few times down and back... which trips felt like all Iowa, all the time, with the rest being comprised of melting rush hours' worth of cities in Texas. 

I have, however, started in the Midwest and finished in the Far West... done that twice now.  Let's see if I can remember the first trip... Ah, yes.  I must have been starting college, because my brother had just finished up and was marrying his sweetheart. I don't remember much about the drive there, and even less about the drive back, although I assume we did that, too.  So I'll confine my memoir to a few items of note.

Noteworthy:

My sister may have just started driving.  I may have almost run over a large blown-out tire in plain view on the interstate.  My dad may have gone slightly crazy driving sleep-deprived through the mountain passes.  He may have stopped part way through, got out of the car with a glazed look in his eyes, checked out the scenery, and started flapping his wings and, well, hooting, for lack of a better term.  My mom may have bought her dress for the wedding in Missoula, MT. 

We stayed overnight in our old hometown in ND.  Must have seen a few people, but I don't recall who... probably "Grandma Margaret."  One of the Grandma Margarets, anyway.  There was a city one and a country one.  I think it was the country one.  Where they lived on a farm, with real farm animals and lots of "barn kitties."  Where we had helped the neighbors slaughter a semi truck full of... chickens?  Turkeys?  I helped pluck one, at any rate.  Or was it the city one?  She had written a children's story book, and used to try and comb the snarls out of my sister's hair whenever she was over.  We stayed with her anytime we were "snowed in"--when the busses couldn't drive us home after it had snowed.  Once, that I recall.  So yes, it might have been her.

We stayed in a hotel for the first time (at least in my memory).  Somewhere in nowhere, MT.  I don't know that my parents have stayed in one since.  Nasty, expensive, unnecessary inconveniences, especially as they don't travel anywhere they can't stay with family.

It started: Flat, few trees, growing drier as you head west.  Then even drier, but rocky.  Then a bit more green, mostly flat, with the exception of buttes.  Then Coeur d'Alene.  Gorgeous.  Then dry.  Then wet.  With some mountains in between.  Fill in the blanks, and you've got Northwestern American Geography!

Ever done one of these drives?  Try it.  Maybe, if you're lucky, you can stay with Grandma Margaret.  Or the other one.