Buckle up…it’s a little long 🙂

Processing Rwanda – March/April, 2023

There are times during travel when time and experience align to create opportunities for reflection. In other circumstances, travel can feel a bit like drinking water out of a firehose – the experiences, observations, and conversations relentlessly flooding the senses. The last month in Rwanda was derinitely the latter.

Committing to the most vulnerable

A few days of hiking along the Costa Brava have given time to reflect, and some themes have emerged to help me make sense of the last month.

At every turn we were awed by the jaw-dropping commitment that so many make to some of the most vulnerable people on the planet. We repeatedly saw smart, talented, indefatigable professionals of every age committing their lives to serving those for whom the lottery of birth gave little (if any) opportunity. Watching Chloe, Sam and their team at Shooting Touch educate and empower youth and women through the gift of basketball and the support of one another proved the power of sport to do good things. (“God, prayer and Shooting Touch get me through each day.”). Seeing the daily 24/7 commitment of the entire ASYV team to serving the almost unimaginable set of needs of Rwanda’s most vulnerable youth was humbling and inspiring. Spending time with Elise and Charlotte at SOLA Afghanistan (in Kigali) brought home the mountains that girls from the Afghan diaspora have to climb in order to gain the basic human rights of education and opportunity. Hearing Chaste and Norris at Bridge2Rwanda or the team at African Leadership University share how they are helping African and Rwandan youth build the skills necessary to succeed in some of the top universities in the world and “do hard things” to shape Africa’s future. Each one of these talented men and women could have chosen a different path – one with less stress, better compensation, fewer hours. Yet they have chosen a life of service.

The hope embodied in young people

For decades, young people have given me energy, optimism, and hope. The last month saw a variety of different but equally meaningful conversations with and among young people from Nobles and ASYV. As had been the case with the other seventeen groups we’ve taken to learn and serve, this Nobles group grappled with so many important questions and issues. “How can such injustice exist in the world? Especially when we have so much.” “These ASYV kids are just as smart and capable as we are – yet our opportunities could not be more different.” “What can we do to help and support now that we know?” At the same time, countless ASYV young people were eager to welcome us into their world in a way that the Nobles students felt visitors would never be welcomed back home. And the willingness of ASYV kids to ask questions like “What do you want your last words to be before you die?” showed the desire to engage in some of life’s most challenging questions. 

Young people often remind me of important things, and it’s hard to be too pessimistic about the world when one spends time with kids like these. 

The power of friendship and family

A special gift on this trip was to spend time with our good friend, Alex Gallagher, to make new friendships with Carly O’Hearn and LaTasha Sarpey from Nobles, and deepen relationships by spending time visiting the homes of JC Nkukiliyimfura, Eric Kabiyona and Alice Tumukunde from ASYV (along with extended time with ASYV grads Edmond and Mabubu from ASYV and GoDiscover Africa). Introducing old friends Alec & Susan Lee to Rwanda was an affirmation of shared values and commitment to use our time and resources to explore, grow, and contribute. To share all of it with Sarah, the love of my life, yet again affirmed her as the best traveling partner the world could offer (and we so miss Abby/Paul and David/Emily – we’ll get them to Rwanda sometime!).

Getting proximate

Bryan Stevenson (the famous American civil rights lawyer/leader and author of Just Mercy) often talks about the importance of “getting proximate” to those who face particular struggles. By ‘getting proximate’ one can develop deeper understanding and greater commitment to people and problems that often seem distant and unsolvable. This month provided a series of opportunities to ‘get proximate’ that both deepened understanding and ongoing commitment on our part. Our lives at home are comfortable beyond belief, and it is far too easy to remove ourselves from the realities that so many face. If this trip accomplished anything, I hope it will be to continue our journey to do what we can to support those doing the really hard work (both in Rwanda and at home). 

Some lingering questions and observations

If you’re still reading this long musing, here are a few lingering thoughts:

• What about the boys? There is SO much good work being done around gender equity and girls/women’s empowerment. But where is the work being done to make sure the boys/men understand how to be “good men” – good fathers, good life partners, fighting against gender based violence that is all too present? 
• How can traumatized youth be empowered to manage and work through their trauma? The mental health needs are massive. The mental health resources are meager. What systems can be built to help?
• I love the way Rwandans introduce themselves by saying, “You’re welcome” (ie; “you are welcome in my home”) and responding to questions with, “Thank you” before they respond (ie; “thank you for caring about what I have to say”).
• Generally, I think “joy” is an overused word. Watching women celebrating a basket at Shooting Touch or students at ASYV responding to a classmate singing or dancing at Village Time reignites and refreshes that word.

“Humbled” and “grateful” are words that can also be overused. Yet the dictionary may not have other words that capture what I feel stepping away from a month in Rwanda. Humbled by the work that so many do, that makes whatever I may have done pale in comparison. Grateful not just for what we have but more importantly grateful for the opportunity to get to know, learn from, and work with such a remarkable country and community of those serving young people (and ASYV in particular). 

The connections, commitments, and friendships will continue. I hope I can do them justice.

Thanks for reading,

Ben

Buckle up…it’s a little long 🙂

Processing Rwanda – March/April, 2023

There are times during travel when time and experience align to create opportunities for reflection. In other circumstances, travel can feel a bit like drinking water out of a firehose – the experiences, observations, and conversations relentlessly flooding the senses. The last month in Rwanda was definitely the latter.

Committing to the most vulnerable

A few days of hiking along the Costa Brava have given time to reflect, and some themes have emerged to help me make sense of the last month.

At every turn we were awed by the jaw-dropping commitment that so many make to some of the most vulnerable people on the planet. We repeatedly saw smart, talented, indefatigable professionals of every age committing their lives to serving those for whom the lottery of birth gave little (if any) opportunity. Watching Chloe, Sam and their team at Shooting Touch educate and empower youth and women through the gift of basketball and the support of one another proved the power of sport to do good things. (“God, prayer and Shooting Touch get me through each day.”). Seeing the daily 24/7 commitment of the entire ASYV team to serving the almost unimaginable set of needs of Rwanda’s most vulnerable youth was humbling and inspiring. Spending time with Elise and Charlotte at SOLA Afghanistan (in Kigali) brought home the mountains that girls from the Afghan diaspora have to climb in order to gain the basic human rights of education and opportunity. Hearing Chaste and Norris at Bridge2Rwanda or the team at African Leadership University share how they are helping African and Rwandan youth build the skills necessary to succeed in some of the top universities in the world and “do hard things” to shape Africa’s future. Each one of these talented men and women could have chosen a different path – one with less stress, better compensation, fewer hours. Yet they have chosen a life of service.

The hope embodied in young people

For decades, young people have given me energy, optimism, and hope. The last month saw a variety of different but equally meaningful conversations with and among young people from Nobles and ASYV. As had been the case with the other seventeen groups we’ve taken to learn and serve, this Nobles group grappled with so many important questions and issues. “How can such injustice exist in the world? Especially when we have so much.” “These ASYV kids are just as smart and capable as we are – yet our opportunities could not be more different.” “What can we do to help and support now that we know?” At the same time, countless ASYV young people were eager to welcome us into their world in a way that the Nobles students felt visitors would never be welcomed back home. And the willingness of ASYV kids to ask questions like “What do you want your last words to be before you die?” showed the desire to engage in some of life’s most challenging questions. 

Young people often remind me of important things, and it’s hard to be too pessimistic about the world when one spends time with kids like these. 

The power of friendship and family

A special gift on this trip was to spend time with our good friend, Alex Gallagher, to make new friendships with Carly O’Hearn and LaTasha Sarpey from Nobles, and deepen relationships by spending time visiting the homes of JC Nkukiliyimfura, Eric Kabiyona and Alice Tumukunde from ASYV (along with extended time with ASYV grads Edmond and Mabubu from ASYV and GoDiscover Africa). Introducing old friends Alec & Susan Lee to Rwanda was an affirmation of shared values and commitment to use our time and resources to explore, grow, and contribute. To share all of it with Sarah, the love of my life, yet again affirmed her as the best traveling partner the world could offer (and we so miss Abby/Paul and David/Emily – we’ll get them to Rwanda sometime!).

Getting proximate

Bryan Stevenson (the famous American civil rights lawyer/leader and author of Just Mercy) often talks about the importance of “getting proximate” to those who face particular struggles. By ‘getting proximate’ one can develop deeper understanding and greater commitment to people and problems that often seem distant and unsolvable. This month provided a series of opportunities to ‘get proximate’ that both deepened understanding and ongoing commitment on our part. Our lives at home are comfortable beyond belief, and it is far too easy to remove ourselves from the realities that so many face. If this trip accomplished anything, I hope it will be to continue our journey to do what we can to support those doing the really hard work (both in Rwanda and at home). 

Some lingering questions and observations

If you’re still reading this long musing, here are a few lingering thoughts:

• What about the boys? There is SO much good work being done around gender equity and girls/women’s empowerment. But where is the work being done to make sure the boys/men understand how to be “good men” – good fathers, good life partners, fighting against gender based violence that is all too present? 
• How can traumatized youth be empowered to manage and work through their trauma? The mental health needs are massive. The mental health resources are meager. What systems can be built to help?
• I love the way Rwandans introduce themselves by saying, “You’re welcome” (ie; “you are welcome in my home”) and responding to questions with, “Thank you” before they respond (ie; “thank you for caring about what I have to say”).
• Generally, I think “joy” is an overused word. Watching women celebrating a basket at Shooting Touch or students at ASYV responding to a classmate singing or dancing at Village Time reignites and refreshes that word.

“Humbled” and “grateful” are words that can also be overused. Yet the dictionary may not have other words that capture what I feel stepping away from a month in Rwanda. Humbled by the work that so many do, that makes whatever I may have done pale in comparison. Grateful not just for what we have but more importantly grateful for the opportunity to get to know, learn from, and work with such a remarkable country and community of those serving young people (and ASYV in particular). 

The connections, commitments, and friendships will continue. I hope I can do them justice.

Thanks for reading,

Ben

This morning I woke up with a new word in my mind, storying. I’m defining it as the act of listening to stories and storing them inside of you.

The story of Edmond, the owner of Go Discover Africa and an ASYV graduate, who drove us and is our friend. The way he feels saved by ASVY and pays kindness forward.

The story of Beck, our guide to the gorillas, his twenty years of being with them and having a map of the park in his head.

The story of Dian Fossey who spent her life protecting the gorillas and lost her life for them.

The story of the gentle Amahora (Peace) gorilla family, eighteen strong.

The story of Rwanda, its brutal, tragic history and the story of its movement forward through truth and clarity.

No story is without sadness and some pretending and some magic. 

When I listen to stories, a stubborn little door in my own damaged heart unlatches, and I am swept into new surprising places.

The story of our trekking in the Virunga Mountains included walking across fields of rich soil, acres of potatoes and pyrethrum flowers (used for a safe alternative to harmful insecticides) and the hard-working farmers, climbing across the high stone border wall of Volcanoes National Park on a hand-made ladder and going into the jungled mountains, someone hacking through sharp nettled leaves, sinking deep into the dark, lush mud, following the person in front of me up and up until we found the trackers who have another story. The way they stay with the gorilla family until they begin making nests with leaves and trees for the night. Then the trackers head home for a few hours before going back to that spot the next morning before the gorillas awake and leave.

Finding and seeing the gorillas is another story. The magical part where you and seven other people along with your guide and a tracker who speaks gorilla sit or stand mere feet from this happy, sleepy family. It’s lunch and nap time, and we are given the gift to join them for an hour, watch the alpha silverback lean into the grass and close his eyes, one mother nurses and grooms her three-month-old baby, young boys are in a constant wrestling match, rolling into and around each other in a mass of shining black fur. They are curious enough to come over to us swinging on a bent bamboo stalk, reaching for a sneaker or a hand until the tracker grunts a little warning to get back. About a dozen of the family of eighteen are with us in this small grassy opening in the jungle. One whole hour of living and breathing together (with masks on—we don’t want to get them sick in any way). Everything is quiet and present on this edge of real and beyond real. And then we leave, storing that story inside of us forever.

We head back to Spain on Sunday after an amazing month in Rwanda.

Stay safe, everyone.

Love,

Sarah

Almost a month now in Rwanda: a whirlwind of moments of truth and powerful experiences. This is the fourth Nobles student trip Ben and I have been on and it will be our last, though certainly not our last trip to this country. Ben knew several of the students, but I knew no one except for Alex Gallagher, a friend I love who makes me laugh a lot who’s the head chaperone. This is not an easy trip. So much sadness to digest; tough, good work under a strong sun and sometimes a deluge of rain, and many rough roads, but Rwanda is filled with joy and beauty. It is a safe place. The kids from Nobles totally stepped up, and all of us learned and grew in surprising ways. There is so much love at Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village and inspiring women on the basketball courts with Shooting Touch. I’m grateful that the Nobles group embraced a stranger like me.

Now we’re traveling with our good friends, Alec and Susan Lee. We’ve already had surprising and serendipitous encounters: an impromptu music session and meaningful conversations with ASYV alumni, young men who generously shared their stories unveiling the power of four years at the Village. It changed the trajectory of their lives. They said they had no future before starting at ASYV, and now five to ten years after their graduations, each is pursuing a dream.

Today we visited SOLA, an amazing place with an more an even more amazing story. This school for Afghan girls is the vision of Shabana Basij-Raskih, a woman I wrote about earlier. She along with others in Kabal and the US helped 256 girls and teachers escape when the Taliban took over. Rwanda welcomed this group with love; doctors and counselors met them at the airport in Kigali, and so many in this country have offered kindness and support for the past twenty months.

In this wobbling world that has been pulled and tested by the prevalence of untruth and hate, I am seeing so much hope in Rwanda. I’m just so grateful for the gifts that come with this kind of travel.

There is gorilla trekking on the horizon :).

Stay safe, everyone.

So three weeks have passed, and I may have forgotten about this blog 🙂

Spain, specifically Barcelona, seems like a dream now, the good kind, full of clear fragments stacked and fueling memory. We walked everywhere is seems. We also had a great bike tour of the city. Here’s what I remember: the clang of church bells, the smell of bread-baking wafting from the open doors of the ubiquitous bakeries, Anthony Gaudi’s fluid walls all curve and movement, being inside the Sagrada Familia and feeling like I was a part of a kaleidoscope, lofts of pigeons and their sturdy iridescent necks, being one of 100,000 in the Barcelona soccer stadium, the quietness in early morning, the kindness of everyone we met, and olives stuffed with anchovies. Yum! We feel so lucky that we’ll be back to this part of the world in a few weeks.

On March 8^th we flew into Kigali, Rwanda, and saw a kind man holding a sign, Ben & Sarah Snyder—Heaven. Yes, that’s the name of our hotel in Kigali. The next day we headed out to ASYV for a few days of meetings with teachers, visiting classes, going to Village Time and Family Time, immersed in this healing place. We listened to stories. Isn’t it all about stories? I think stories are our humanness, how we touch each other.

On Sunday, the 12^th, we were back at the airport to pick up the 24 students & chaperones from Nobles. We’re with these intrepid travelers until March 24^th. Ben and I have been leading this trip with others for four years pre-Covid. It is a whirlwind of experiencing and learning. We started at the genocide memorials which are truth-telling and heart-wrenching. We immersed ourselves into a group of great students and leaders at African Leadership University, finding such inspiration and hope in their hunger for success and love of learning.

Yesterday was about animals and the beauty of the Rwandan hills and lakes in Akagera National Park. A safari turns me into a kid again, that dashing around in an open-top jeep in search of and finding amazing animals. And now for the next week we are ensconced in the healing community of ASYV, a place filled with greenness, birdsong, and love.

Thanks for reading!

Stay safe out there.

Love,

Sarah

On Thursday we fly to Spain and then Rwanda for six weeks all together, and I decided to start up the blog again. Today in Vermont we have a real winter. Finally. Endless snow, every tree holding some on its trunk and branches. You have to cover all of you to walk out the door and that inimitable crunch of boots in the deepness. It’s beautiful. But it’s hard not to think about all the suffering in the world. Ukraine. Turkey. Syria. This Sunday on 60 Minutes I watched how a thirty-two year-old woman from Afghanistan, Shabana Basij-Rasikh (who went to Middlebury), the founder of SOLA, a school for Afghan girls, was able to get 256 girls and teachers out of the country before it fell into the dark cave of Taliban men. She has reignited her school in Rwanda. We will be in Rwanda for a month doing service and volunteering and learning, and we’ll visit SOLA. I can never imagine being as good a person as Shaban Basij-Rasiks, but I’m able to use a pen and paper and my fingers; I will breathe in her words in Rwanda and bring back something here to share.

As usual, Ben and I are lean packers, only a carry-on; so I am in the process of getting stuff out and then taking away half of that. Books are tricky. I’m not a Kindle reader. I just came back from The Norwich Bookstore with three paperbacks (see photo below), recommended highly by Andi, a friend who works there.

We have two round trip flights: Boston/Barcelona and Barcelona/Kigali. We’re in Barcelona for four days (Airbnb in the cool, recommended area of Gracia); the only thing we have planned there is a soccer game, of course, and exploring. Then we head to Rwanda for a month—lots of stuff to do and learn there. This will be our sixth visit. Ben is about to be the chair of the board of an organization we were first introduced to in 2015, Agahosa Shalom Youth Village. We’ll be with the Nobles student trip for two weeks and with friends and just exploring and being of any help we can as we learn and grow. Then back to Barcelona and a seven-day hike in Catalonia. Then home.

One more thing, a shameless plug: my new book, Now These Three Remain is out there and ready to be bought at either my publisher, the amazing Lily Poetry Review Books, or on Amazon. I will be having readings when I return, the Lily Zoom launch at 2:00 pm on Sunday, April 23^rd (also Shakespeare’s alleged birthday :).

Thanks for following us along another journey.

Be safe out there.

xoxo,

Sarah

the beauty we’re leaving behind but coming back to

books I can’t wait to read

& my book 🙂

As we have both shared, over the last 4+ months (and hopefully over the last 30+ years together) feelings of gratitude have been somewhat overwhelming during this journey – which perhaps ‘officially’ ended with reunion weekend at Nobles earlier this month. So some thoughts about the trip – and about what comes next (if anyone is reading and/or at all interested).

First – the trip. I love data (simple data, however!). So here is some from the trip:

• 11,448 miles driven on American roads
• 50% (roughly) of miles NOT driven on interstate highway
• 30 states traveled to or through
• 2 incredibly beautiful countries – the US and Chile
• 332 (approx) miles hiked
• 440 (approx) miles biked
• 14 Nobles graduates visited along the way
• Favorite new national park – Capital Reef (UT)
• Favorite new US city – Nashville (thanks, Ned!)
• Most surprising/impressive state park – Palo Duro Canyon (outside of Amarillo, TX – go there if you can!)
• Favorite new country – Chile. Wow. (It was also the only new country – but, man, it was amazing)
• Best protest witnessed – International Women’s Day – Santiago, Chile
• Most fun Sarah discovery – downhill skiing again! (Thanks, Parizeaus!)
• Ben’s favorite Memory Lane moment – biking/hiking in Cedar Run, PA (the Bowdoin crowd will appreciate this)
• Favorite hike – too many to name just one (we get asked this regularly)
• Biggest physical challenges – the W-Trek/Torres del Paine and Cerro Castillo – both in Patagonia
• Longest single drive – 833 miles from Hattiesburg, MS to Amarillo, TX
• Most meaningful conversation – so many, but learning from the director of the Courthouse Museum in Monroeville, AL was an important one
• Most powerful museum – The Legacy Museum and National Memorial for Peace and Justice (otherwise known as Lynching Memorial) in Montgomery, AL – a place for all Americans to learn
• Coolest wildlife – elephant seals in Cambria, CA
• Most generous hosts – Julia/T/Aunt Nancy in Santa Fe (thank you!) – who knew we’d swing by three times!?
• Most patient person – Sarah by far for putting up w/ me. 

    A former colleague always talked about “getting after it” with young people – be it on a team, in the classroom, or in life. It feels like we “got after it” on this trip and looking back, it seems like we took pretty full advantage of the opportunity. 

    Second, home and my ‘next chapter’. 

    Certainly, this trip gave me time to think about what comes next. What was fairly easy to do was come up with five ‘buckets’ of priorities.

• Bucket #1 – Family and friends – It goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway) the highest priority for this chapter is making time for the people who matter the most and having the flexibility to create the time to be together whenever possible.
• Bucket #2 – Fitness, health, fun – For both my physical and mental health I need to put the time into this part of life and especially build in time to be outside. One of the best parts about the trip was simply being outdoors for big chunks of every day. 
• Bucket #3 – Meaning – I’ve been so fortunate to have meaningful work be integral to my professional and personal lives. I need to land on something(s) that can be built into the day to day but not interfere with buckets one and two. 
• Bucket #4 – Learning – There are so many things I’d like to learn. Where (in person? Online?)? When (daily? Weekly?) Experiential or academic? Both? Lots to think about. 
• Bucket #5 – Community – One piece of the timing of stepping away from Nobles was to have enough time to build a community in the Upper Valley. We have a number of good friends yet need to continually expand the circle. 

To be able to live in this beautiful place (just follow Sarah on Instagram and you’ll see sunset after sunset) is a gift beyond compare. And to know that we have the resources to travel, to support a comfortable life, and to support some causes we believe in is something few people in this world have. 

At the same time, there will be two major adjustments for me. Other than sabbaticals, I’ve basically worked full-time (when not in school) for forty years – and to not have that routine will be both a welcome change and require some attitude tweaking. That said, my work life has been so incredibly interpersonal (literally hundreds of interactions every day) and has generated so much positive energy and meaning for me, that I need to figure out where that energy and meaning will come from. I’m not sure yet and while I know I need to be patient in finding those things, my natural impatience could get in the way. We’ll see…and the bottom line is that it’s good to be home, to sleep in the same bed every night, to marvel at the natural beauty, be with my best friend and person I love the most, and be grateful for all we have. 

If you get this far, thanks for reading, listening and being part of our journey.

Two weddings on the horizon—so fun!

Stay safe, everyone ❤️.

Actually three weeks ago we rolled into our driveway in Vermont, but those weeks have been chock-filled. We’ve been back and forth to Nobles and Boston for fun and surprise for Ben, a wonderful three days with family, the best imaginable Mother’s Day of delicious diner fare (My Diner) including a table sharing stack of pancakes (thank you, Dave Barnes for that amazing idea), lovely cards from my kids, the presence of their fiancés, and the rest of the day wedding-dress shopping with Abby (yes, she said yes to a dress, and no, there will not be a photo of it below). All of that in addition to digging out of four months of mail and tracking down magazine subscriptions that have been returned or stopped. And I have begun to dive back into things I love and have missed doing like cooking and being immersed in poetry workshops and even one poetry reading. And Ben is now realizing that he’s actually retired 🙂 He is becoming the resident gardener.

I want to say thank you to all of you who’ve traveled with Ben and me around the country and to Chile and read our musings.

I may continue to write some pieces here, and I’m certain Ben will be writing, definitely one more entry here soon, and then he may start his own blog.

Below are photos from the end of our trip as we headed East, starting with our last night in Santa Fe where Julia, Ben, and I went to an Earth, Wind, & Fire concert. Beyond fun!

Thanks again for reading & following us. Stay safe, everyone. ❤️

It would be a great Wordle word, by the way.

Ever since we hiked Fortynine Palm Oasis Trail in Joshua Tree National Park, I have been thinking about the word. It was such a surprising eruption of lush green giant palm trees in the middle of sand, rock, hills, & scrub. It was a miracle really, underground water surfacing just where humans and longhorn sheep need it. Oasis comes from Latin and Hamitic language, like Egyptian. It means a fertile spot in the desert, a relief, a refuge. It’s a bit like the mirror image of an island in a vast ocean: a small place of water in a sea of sand.

I just like the word (all those vowels), its sound, its meaning, and the metaphor it offers.

How a whole world can seem filled with suffering, and yet we find places of refuge. 

In the Trump years amid that pall of relentless sadness, Stephen Cobert was an oasis for me. During those first endless and frightening no-vaccination-in-sight months of Covid, huddling with friends and family in the snowy air on our light-strewn patio with tower heaters and beers in mittened hands, that was an oasis.

Poetry is an oasis for me every day. Writing is. Ben is. Bird song is. My children are. My family is. My friends are. Trees are. Breathing is—being aware of my breathing is because then I am thankful.

Oases are everywhere I think.

In the last twenty-four hours I have read two articles that seem so connected to the power of finding and seeing oases that I’d recommend: The Atlantic piece by Arthur C. Brooks “How to Want Less” and in The Marginalian by Maria Popova a piece about the vision and words of poet, Ross Gay’s The Book of Delights: Yearlong Experiment in Willful Gladness.

The first thing I’m going to do when we get home is buy Ross Gay’s book.

Stay safe, everyone! ❤️

I’ve had a fascination with religion ever since I connected it to my fear of death in college when I walked into Professor Geoghegan’s classroom and was mesmerized by all he knew and heard a new language, words like numinous and paradox, words I had to look up in a real dictionary back in my dorm room. So much grew inside me there, a love of stories, a compassion for all of us as we lived our lives knowing we’d die and finding ways to go on through stories and faith.

My favorite books back then were The Courage to Be by Paul Tillich and I and Thou by Martin Buber. I loved Simone Weil and the Buddha. Everything I read and learned through mystics and Buddhists in those four years made sitting in a pew at the Presbyterian church in Moorestown, N.J. playing hangman with my sister on the back of the Sunday program seem so tame and uninteresting (though I did love the strength of a Mary saying she was carrying a child of a god). For many reasons I never embraced the religion I grew up with.

Today I have faith in something both invisible and real, something I feel while hiking and biking or just really listening and talking with another—the space between us sacred and spiritual.

And I realize the strong faith I have in drivers when I’m on a bicycle. While Ben and I biked down Highway 1 from Moonstone Beach in Cambria to Cayucos and back today, I was never scared. (I do wear bright colors, have lights on both the front and back of my bike, and only choose roads with wide shoulders).

And I know shit happens. Big horribleness. 

But mostly it doesn’t. The monarchs here in California somehow make it to Jericho Street in Vermont every year. Life mostly is good (though not for so many in Ukraine right now…). 

The planets and their moons stay obedient to some gravity. An invisible force tying us all together.

From yesterday’s hike in San Simeon

Stay safe out there! ❤️