I think of the hymn “How Can I Keep From Singing?” as Quaker in origin, but that doesn’t appear to be historically accurate. It was certainly adopted by Quakers, around the time of the abolitionist era. “How Can I Keep From Singing?” (1868) My life goes on in endless songAbove earth’s lamentations,I hear the real,…
Category: The Spirit
Good Bones (poem)
Good Bones By Maggie Smith (2015) Life is short, though I keep this from my children. Life is short, and I’ve shortened mine in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways, a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways I’ll keep from my children. The world is at least fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative estimate, though I keep this…
George Fox on the Ocean of Darkness (quote)
This quote from George Fox’s journal from 1647 feels apropos right now, a couple of days before the election: I saw also that there was an ocean of darkness and death, but an infinite ocean of light and love, which flowed over the ocean of darkness.
The Hype Man
Every day at the rink I see skaters working on “unlocking” a move — backwards skating, transitions, spins, crazy legs… I see their knitted brows and frowns as they concentrate on getting it down, sometimes for five minutes, sometimes for weeks or months. I don’t always offer tips or help, because not everyone wants that….
Six Months of PT in the Bag!
Today I’m celebrating six months of physical therapy! On the plus side, doing daily PT I believe has helped to mitigate knee pain and be able to walk for longer periods of time. And the exercises are not too onerous — basically they are part of my daily morning prep and evening wind down, which…
My Self-Care Circle
I did this back in 2021, but it still does a pretty job of expressing different ways that I show care and love to myself. How I express self-care:
Bella is Gone But…. Meet My New Motor Scooter!
A week and a half ago, my luck with Bella the motor scooter finally ran out. Bella was stolen from a motorcycle parking lot in SOMA in a brief 20 minute window while I was getting dinner at the new IKEA food hall. It really really sucks to lose her. I had a lot of…
Quakers as a Shared Culture and Epistemology
I have long ruminated about the challenge of living in a digital society where we no longer seem to have a common culture that roots us. It feels like, in generations past, Americans had a more universal experience where we did the same things (e.g. bowling) and consumed the same media (the Bible, the three…
Old Wounds into New Material
Years and years ago, a close friend made me a scarf that I never wore. It was just a too big for me and not really my style. Then they abruptly ended our friendship in an unexpected and painful way that left me feeling deeply hurt and confused for awhile. But out of some weird…
“The world breaks everyone….”
“The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.” Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms