The sails frame the clouds, like a door frame across the threshold of my home. I’m transported to the Missouri River, can feel the humidity in the thickness of the clouds, and smell the pungent odor of the water. The Missouri’s beauty is wide and deep, framed by cliffs and hills that buttress the prairie…
Ecclesiastes: “I know that there is nothing better for them than to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live; moreover, it is God’s gift that all should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil. . . So I commend enjoyment, for there is nothing better for people under the…
When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was without shape or form, it was dark over the deep sea, and God’s wind swept over the waters. “Watch your step!” Sheila’s warning coincides with my fall off the ladder, landing on my knees. She had told me not to come down the…
Winter: Turbulent northwest winds usher in blizzard conditions, leaving Dakota buried under ice and snow that piles along the roads, crusting into white and black. In 2013, winter arrived prematurely when a blizzard blanketed western South Dakota, killing tens of thousands of cattle, horses, and sheep. In one day, the West River rains switched to…
“My father was very sure about certain matters pertaining to the universe. To him all good things–trout as well as eternal salvation–come by grace and grace comes by art and art does not come easy.” Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It “Get brave,” Sheila said. “It’s only paint.” I’m sure that my grandfather practiced…
I had thought that when I turned 60 I would have fewer questions about life and more answers. But the exact opposite has happened. As my own mortality looms closer on the horizon of life, my field of vision has expanded the boundaries of life’s meaning and stretched me further than I could imagine. At…