Soft in the Middle
"A man walks down the street, says 'Why am I soft in the middle now? Why am I soft in the middle when the rest of my life is so hard?'" PAUL SIMON Paul Simon wrote this song during or…
That’s The Way I Like It
I can’t tell if this is an interesting etymological revelation, or if it’s something that everyone else has always already known, and I’ve been slow to notice. At any rate, it’s taken me fifty years to think about the fact…
AND ANOTHER THING…
I’m not coming up with my usual smart answers. I’ve been racking my noggin’ to craft a clever and pithy framing for it all. I’ve scoured shelvesful of poetry and mysticism. I spent half a morning opening various spiritual books…
Mind the Gap
I was utterly charmed by the way English was spoken in London — the particular words and phrases we’d hear every day, the “Britishisms.” Sometimes I’m sort of a sponge with my environment, so I had to watch out for…
The Beauty of It
There was a video on social media a few weeks ago in which a high-school student filmed her classmates and teachers, stopping them in the hallways and classrooms and cafeteria, telling them: “I am working on a project about things…
Mystic or Manilow?
Several years ago I created a short quiz for a class I was teaching. I presented participants with lines of verse — some were contemporary pop lyrics, others were bits of sacred poetry from various traditions — and invited them…
Big Time
“The great thing about getting older is that you don’t lose all the other ages you’ve been.”Madeleine L'Engle I’ve got a big birthday coming up next week. Fifty. Five-Oh. I’m a bit boggled by it. Frankly, it’s a lot more…
PEEP ON PEEPING ON
You’ve probably heard the old story about the farmer whose horse ran away. When they heard, the farmer’s neighbors gathered to commiserate, “How unfortunate!” The farmer said, “Maybe. We shall see…” Within a couple of days the horse came home,…
FULL EXTENSION
My sweet friend Romy complimented me on my “extension” after dance class last week. It felt really good. I’m a pretty big guy, so when I spread out my arms or stretch my legs, I can take up a…
What’s Church?
The sacred shouldn’t suck. For the past decade, I’ve been asking, “Why spiritual community? Is it worth the hassle?” I mean, it’s pretty obvious that religious organization tends to be full of problems and pitfalls. Nobody has to look…