Car Trip/Pilgrimage to Southern Colorado Pilgrimage: in which I drive hundreds of miles into a pastoral land to visit a prayer labyrinth, and search for spiritual answers on how to live, and, perhaps, the meaning of life. There are various spiritual journeys that one could go on, and among these the pilgrimage has a long […]
Movie Review, Odyssey, 2026 The movie is great if you liked Interstellar, and Inception. But for me, this big pic (IMAX sized) visual spectacle lost the heart of both its main character and the culture from which the story flowed from the very first scenes. Director and media darling Christopher Nolan can do
In which I go on Ancestry.com: Sometime ago, I first became aware of the online family tree builder and genealogical research tool, Ancestry.com. Some friends and relatives had been using it before me, probably more people than I could actually list, and key genealogists on both my father’s and my mother’s side were becoming knowledgeable […]
Flying to Japan Over the middle of the Pacific, 32,000 feet in the air, the sea is a blue mat far below, the clouds a dotted carpet of white puffballs. In that moment, not sure whether it is day or night (the windows have gone blue; instead of shades, in this new plane they darken
Leaving on a Japan Trip Now perhaps leaving on a Japan trip is too vague…I actually don’t usually go to Japan so it should be leaving on the Japan trip but I don’t like to say that because to me it sounds scarier. Sitting on my porch in Fort Collins on Sunday morning, I
Why I started my blog? When I started Susan Taylor Brand I wanted something that would allow me to post about what I was learning these days, these days in which there is so much new and yet so much can be missed. In particular I wanted to talk about changes in life that come
To begin with: all right, I admit it. I was turning 60. This is not something you like to talk about. After all, this trigger for this discouragement, this turning 60, it’s pretty unchangeable. Never mind all that talk about age is just a number. Age may be just a number but it is a
Mondo dizmo: Noun. Definition: A man who is not to be trusted. To women in particular, a self-centered exploiter. Mondo Dismo is an expression that I first heard of in Romancing the Stone, the 1983 adventure/romance starring Katherine Turner and Michael Douglas The premise is that a homebody romance writer, Joan Wilder, finds herself suddenly
Today’s Aphorism: “Lying to others is the exception. Mostly we lie to ourselves.” Friedrich Nietzsche We think we are only lying when we knowingly tell someone something else that isn’t true. In fact, we are often engaged in refusing to see the truth ourselves. Thus, Nietzsche says, “Lying to others is the expection.” You might
Mother’s Day when Mom is a grandma? Yes. But first, let’s go back to the beginning. Where my dad said Mother’s Day was a conspiracy started by Hallmark to sell greeting cards. Perhaps this was the beginning of my dicey relationship with Mother’s Day. Not to mention my mother’s feelings about it. Mother’s Day is
