The Late Arrival

The powder blue rental bikes are soldiers lined up in formation under a clear, spring sky waiting for twenty-something singles, newlyweds, families with kids who have long ago ditched training wheels, empty-nesters, and those with broken marriages, broken homes and broken dreams. They wait to be used for a slowed down exploration of the life that, up until now, had been under the grips of a long, dormant, cold season. They seem to understand that the cycle of sun, warmth and rain has brought to fruition blooming and reawakening. For a minute, I think I hear them say: Push one pedal, push another and feel your knees do what they were created to do with each revolution. No one is behind you honking and in a hurry to pass on to the next thing. Go ahead, squeeze the brakes. Stop. Now look – and actually see – what you’ve been missing while driving. This season is shorter than you think. For many years, my car was being wife, mother, clocking in, clocking out and trying to c...

It started with the bananas. It always does. They had been receptive to bananas for a while, my daughter and husband. Me too, if I was being honest. But our romance with the bananas began to fade as did the fruit's once creamy yellow skin. Eat these bananas soon! announced my husband as if someone in the house must surely still love them. These bananas are going bad! Someone needs to eat them before they do! As if he wasn’t a ‘someone' who could eat them. I lied and said it was my full intention to make banana bread out of what now looked like October leaves. They were beyond dead; and I trashed them with a wince, thinking of how my mother loathed waste. A giggle barged into my wince as I thought of a dear friend who often said he was so old, he didn’t even buy green bananas. The thing they don’t tell you about October leaves-bananas is that they attract fruit flies. And after you toss the bananas, the fruit flies stay…I don’t know why, maybe they’re hopi...

File this one under Understanding Stuff a Week After it Happens. At first glance, last Sunday’s sermon about the story of Jesus healing a blind man in an unconventional way (as if there’s a conventional way to restore sight) was about a miracle...and mud. But I think there’s more to this miraculous story that speaks to everyone, regardless of belief in the story or faith, or no faith at all. If you’re unfamiliar, here it is: Blind Guy is poor, looked down upon by everyone. The Bible doesn’t even say his name – he’s just BLIND GUY. Anyway, Blind Guy is disenfranchised because somehow, someway society back then believed his blindness was probably deserved for something his parents did or something he did. (Some things never change: how are the poor, refugee, immigrant and ‘other’ viewed today?) Enough editorializing. I’ll go on. Anyway, Blind Guy is so desperate and without dignity, he’ll ask anyone for help – including Jesus, Who in turn spits on the ground, mix...