Our Kids– The Ones We Have, Plus More
My husband and I may have become, strangely enough, mostly empty-nesters; but darned if children don’t keep popping up all over the place. And sometimes they even come with birds. I happened upon this sweet sculpture in the Boston Public Garden the other day. Maybe you’ve been charmed by the piece, too. Called “Boy and Bird Fountain,”(even though there wasn’t any water flowing) it’s near the Arlington Street side. Since I was in town to attend a conference with accomplished … Read More
It’s Easter, and More
Over the course of the past Holy Week, my husband was preparing for services culminating with Easter today — the pinnacle of the Christian calendar. Meanwhile, I was, for the first time, teaching a unit on ancient India to high school juniors. In my mind’s eye, I saw temples with elaborate carvings and women in colorful saris as I made the daily drive up and down a fairly bland stretch of highway. It made for a kind of interesting mash-up … Read More
From My Own Book of Revelation: All Pastors’ Wives are not Alike
Not long after I started this blog three and a half years ago, some people questioned the title. They said, “Why identify yourself as a ‘pastor’s wife’ when you’re obviously more than that? It’s so limiting.” This is true to an extent. In a way, I guess, I was poking some fun—right from the beginning—at the label. Show me a stereotype, almost any kind, and I’ll try hard to show the exception. In this case, I didn’t have to try … Read More
I’m Doing This on (Re)purpose, So I’m Sure
On any given day, would you describe yourself as more “purposing” or “repurposing”? Is one superior to the other, or do they roll about the same? Is there a kind of inevitability to shifting purposes, or do we have some say in the matter? Oh, and does it depend on whether you’re a person or a building? To get started on this contrast, I have to display the current image I have in my head when I hear the first … Read More
What Holds You Up? In a Good Way, I Mean
Here we go, into the beating heart of the Christian calendar again. In observance of the first day of Lent yesterday, my husband once again participated in “Ashes to Go” in downtown Concord. Apparently it, or they, went quite well. The weather was practically balmy, and lots of people stopped by. I was reminded of human mortality too…just from a little distance away. At this time of year, I am also reminded of the fact that I didn’t grow up with … Read More
Computer Updates,Theories of the Universe, and Interceptions: Ah, the Wonders of Youth
It might be a kind of sacrilege to tamper with the words of a treasured poet, but if I were bold enough to give ol’ William Wordsworth something like an update, I know which famous line I’d aim for first. “The Child is father of the Man” (from one of his short poems, “My Heart Leaps Up”) is perfectly fine, of course, in its suggestion that we all have everything that we’re going to become in us at an early … Read More
Sports Mom, the Second Half
I have an artist friend who paints beautiful background murals for museum exhibits. He says modestly that often people don’t much notice them, even though of course they took him hours of careful work, because real creatures—a moose, an elk, a family of wolves perhaps– are front and center. Such it is, I think, only kind of in reverse, with the dramas going on in our lives versus what’s happening in the larger arena outside and all around us. Sometimes, … Read More
Dr. Martin Luther King, Extremist
You wouldn’t have thought so, would you? But that is, in fact, how Dr. King referred to himself in his magnificent “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” written in April, 1963. We’ll get to that text in a minute, and it’s worth waiting for. First, though, since the whole concept of “extremism” has been thrust at us almost non-stop in recent days, let’s take a moment to consider how the word actually reverberates. Not surprisingly, it can take on completely different realities … Read More
Madonna and Me: On the Borderline
Did you ever think, when New Year’s Day rolls around, it might be time to sneer at those paltry resolutions and go for a really big change? Leave your old self behind and step into a whole new identity perhaps? I apologize for being late with my post here, but that’s because I’ve been cooking up a really exciting idea. How’s this for starting off 2015 with some flair? Pastor’s Wife takes a big dose of Pop Queen and … Read More
The Right Choice is Yours to Make
Since it was “beginning to look a lot like Christmas” already about a month ago–or was it October– it’s not so easy to feel the full force of the crescendo now, especially when we have compelling reasons to pay attention to other, dare I say bigger issues, such as protests over police killings around the nation and the racial divide that stubbornly persists in this country. I’m going to leave that important topic to others, however, and present to you … Read More