Daily Connector | Learning a New Art | Sarah Werner
One of the skills I’ve tried to hone this spring has been nature photography. I have loved taking photos of plants and animals for a long time, and it used to be a regular part of my job back when I worked in a plant ecology lab. On some of my increasingly long walks this spring, I found myself slowing down to admire the beauty of spring wildflowers and started taking my camera with me when I went out. After getting frustrated when photos didn’t turn out quite how I wanted them, I checked out some ebooks on photography and started studying. Here are a few of my recent shots. 1. Cucumber vines searching for the sunlight 2. The biggest dogwood tree I’ve ever seen in the wild, Sharon Woods Metropark 3.Lavender from my garden 4. Lucky at sunset 5. Orange mint from my garden 6. Petunias after the rain
Daily Connector | Shared humanness | Roberta Gerlach
The brutal treatment and killing of the handcuffed George Floyd has set off protests and destructive riots in cities across the country. Would not an understanding of our shared humanness have caused us to pause and take to heart the words in this poem. UNDER THE SKIN Mary Spain* Come, meet me in the dark with outstretched hands I would not know your colour or your kind; And do not speak, in case my biased mind Forms judgement long before it understands The words you use. Conceal from me the lands You’ve travelled through, the culture that’s entwined In all your thoughts, the politics you find Acceptable, the ground where your faith stands. If I could come as nakedly as you, Abandoning my way of life and creed, Forgetting those ideas I’m closest to And recognizing what I really need; Could we, for just a moment, see right through Our
Midweek Blog: What’s Before Us?
Staying at home during the pandemic has given me lots of time to do more reading. A few weeks ago I even stayed up past my normal bed time to finish a book about the Enneagram that I was especially enjoying. I pushed through to the end and went to bed with lots of new thoughts swirling around in my head. The next morning I woke, and one of the very first things I saw scrolling through social media was an article detailing the spiritual and psychological abuse that more than 30 people had experienced and witnessed from the author of the book I had just finished, Chris Heuertz. It was around that same time that multiple credible accusations of sexual and spiritual abuse were being made against David Haas, a composer who is featured many times in our hymnals. I don’t pay much attention to the composer credits at
Daily Connector | Arrows | Jenny Campagna
I have been feeling badly about not protesting for Black Lives Matter. I worry about my health issues, my twelve years’ older partner and her health issues. Dan Halterman, my neighbor, is a protest parade of one which seems fairly safe. He passes by my house and I’m not there to join him because I’ve been in class for my expressive arts therapy designation or babysitting Anthony. I guess the grateful Little Caesar’s employee gave him and his new friend a pizza on Cleveland Avenue. My two younger children did go downtown bringing supplies, putting their white bodies to the front. I tried to comfort myself with the words from the Bible, “Children are arrows in my liver.” It doesn’t say that. That’s what my pastor father said. He was an only child with seven children. When he died, we put seven arrows in his coffin and buried him with
Daily Connector | Finding my roots – Part 1 | Larry Less
In my first Daily Connector in April, I shared about my Polish heritage and introduced you to Dublin’s Kosciuszko Park. When I was working, I did not have much of an interest in genealogy. Meanwhile Sally would sit down with my Grandmother on most of our trips to Pittsburgh, gather stories and work on my family tree, while I was out back with my uncles drinking beer and pitching horseshoes all day. That all changed after I retired when I went to an aunt’s funeral in Pittsburgh. Sally was still working so she suggested that I take along the family tree that she had done. She had not worked on it for a long time and asked me to get some updates while I was there. That’s when I got bit! I added about 30 names as I caught up-to-date with many of my 40+ first cousins. We joined the
