Acts of Kindness Expand our Capacity to Love Last Sunday, our parish deacon, David Hammer, delivered an excellent homily in which he challenged us to be kind because kindness expands our capacity to love. I found that sentiment to be especially profound because love is the thing from which all else flows. And as we … Continue reading Have courage, be kind
"We Were Soldiers," the 2002 action movie set during the Vietnam War, got some mixed reviews from the critics—however, there’s no escaping the film’s depiction of the sheer brutality of battle, even 20 years after it was released. When it first came out, my husband, Bill, and I went to see it. Bill, a Vietnam … Continue reading We Were Soldiers
Back in June 2004, country star Tim McGraw released "Live Like You Were Dying," which even now causes me to tear up. Over the last 18 years, that piece hasn't lost its power--perhaps because the lyrics rise above standard country fare to the realm of the profound. It begs the question of how one should … Continue reading Live like you were dying
This Sunday, our nation--and our world--will mark a solemn anniversary. Twenty-one years ago, 19 militants representing a little-known group of extremist Muslims attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon using jetliners bound for the West Coast. Nearly 3,000 people died as a result and the world we thought we knew was changed forever. In … Continue reading 9/11: 21 years later
Back in 1967, when the Beatles released the "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," the album which included Paul McCartney's song, "When I'm Sixty-Four," I was a 9-year-old kid, growing up in Tecumseh. My folks had just finished building their "forever" home on Gove Court and we moved there from Cairns Street in May that … Continue reading When I’m Sixty-Four…
The purpose of authority is to serve. I ran across this quote in a commentary on St. James, whose feast day is celebrated July 25 in the Catholic Church. It ties together all of the various leadership fads of the last 30 years, starting back in the 1990s with W. Edwards Deming and his leadership … Continue reading The purpose of authority
Published January 20, 2022 in The Tecumseh Herald A couple of days ago, I pulled in to the Perky Pantry on E. Chicago for a fill-up. I typically pump my own gas but it was before 9 a.m. and I was making a breakfast run to McDonald's. I thought about getting gas only after I … Continue reading Blessings of a small town life
Time for a cool change? In March, the United Nations released the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's report on how global warming is affecting not only our planet but our lives and livelihoods. The IPPC report is by far the most comprehensive--and grim--accounting of the impact humanity is having on greenhouse gas emissions. Our window … Continue reading Climate Change is now
In July 2018, I was doing a photo shoot with my daughter and granddaughters out at McCourtie Park near Somerset Center. We were walking around and discovered a small rock painted bright purple, sporting the words, "Have courage and be kind." I left the rock where I had found it after taking a quick photo. … Continue reading Kindness is the best policy
PFC Marx Tittjung and Pvt. Melvin Kretzger may not have known each other before they were shipped to the Italian front in 1944. But they died within months of each other on a battlefield in Florence, their short lives marked by a pair of simple white crosses. Tittjung and Kretzger are two of the 4,400 … Continue reading A battlefield far away
SQUIBS 