Spring fatigue—it’s a thing, right? Tiredness that we wish we could shake off even as the days lengthen in northern climes? Instead of more energy as daylight hours increase, lethargy. Instead of buoyancy, weariness. In my part of the world in the Canadian Pacific Southwest, the sap is rising, yes. I can hardly complain! Snowdrops …
The Christmas greenery and sparkle in the stores have long been replaced by red and pink heart decorations, also bright on darker days if you live in northern climes. The greeting card aisles are chock-full with messages like “You’re the One I’ll Always Love,” “You’re in My Heart Forever,” or “You Changed My Life in …
January: A new number on the calendar, another opportunity for those New Year’s resolutions. But sometimes the December festivities leave us a tad tired (and that’s a polite way of putting it). Maybe the Christmas tree is still up. If Christmas was a good season, it really is a sweet reminder, too precious to take …
I come from people who made paper stars for Christmas. They made them in their native Poland, and when their pilgrimage took them to Canada’s West Coast where I was born, they were still making them. And here my parents taught my siblings and me to make them. The many hours we spent together peacefully …
November, for me, is a natural month to ponder the passage of time from birth to dying. Typically, October winds and rain in Canada’s Pacific Southwest leave many trees barren as they stand soldierly for All Saints’ Day on the 1st. And with the dying year our hearts grow perhaps more attuned to hold vigil …
How hard is it, really, to be grateful? How ready are we, to show appreciation, to say “Thank you”—and totally mean it—knowing that without that person, without that experience, we would not be who we are today? October brings Thanksgiving Weekend for Canadians, and helps turn our thoughts to gratitude. The second Monday in October, …
The best fairy tales teach us that we live in community, and that we are offered countless gifts to help us on our way. Good magic happens through community. Brother and sister hold hands, defeat the witch in the forest, and find their way back home again. The ugly duckling, so-called, finds his true identity …
“And they all lived happily ever after.” How do you react to these magical words from fairy tale? Is it delight over this dream from the land of wonder? Or is the gap between such beauty and your own lived experience too painful? And just what does “happily ever after” even mean? How about this …
If it hasn’t happened to you yet, it will most likely happen: this weird thing people call “bifocal vision.” When your vision starts going wonky so that your arm isn’t long enough to decipher what’s right in front of you, you need help: you need bifocal glasses. When it happened to me, it seemed to …
These words by George MacDonald in the novel Phantastes always challenge me: “Joy cannot unfold the deepest truths, although deepest truth must be deepest joy. Cometh white-robed Sorrow, stooping and wan, and flingeth wide the doors she may not enter. Almost we linger with Sorrow for very love” (ch. 10). Sorrows’ Doors—the portal to deepest …
Monika Hilder 