My heart hurts. It’s not from the normal wear and tear of life, but rather from what I am seeing around me. Constant bickering, complaining, and arguing. As Tom would say, “Even the Cooking Channel has Cupcake Wars these days.”
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If this were a normal year, my letter would be all about the Hawkeyes and the start of college football.
But 2020 is anything but normal – right?
Each Fall, beginning this week, Tom would wake up early Saturday morning and hang his Hawkeye flag outside, waiting anxiously for College GameDay to begin. He would proceed to watch any and every game until the Hawkeyes played for the week.
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I am bored.
I am ready for schools and businesses to open and for things to get back to normal.
Do you remember the movie Groundhog Day, with Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell? One day follows another and it is the same thing over and over. For us, the long, hot summer drags on. The waiting continues.
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The other day I was doing my morning workout which involves a little run around the block. In the past, I REALLY ran – marathons, races, and anything that had a start and a finish. But not anymore. I just simply run around the block and I am pretty sure that the grandkids could walk it faster than I run. But, shh! I don’t want to embarrass myself.
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For the first time in 132 years, Hotel del Coronado temporarily suspended operations.
The first time in 132 YEARS…
The world has changed. Our way of working, our trends, our hobbies, our communities, and our daily rhythms are different. We are living in a paradigm that is unprecedented and so sudden it feels surreal and there is no date when we go back to the way it used to be.
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This morning I opened a notebook and in Tom’s handwriting was “The culture and times we live in are not easily conducive to spiritual growth . . . we want instant gratification. Spiritual Growth in fact is ongoing and difficult … but mandatory.”
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Pandemic – that word never meant much to me. Pandemics are historic things that happened before there was medicine or in countries that are not as sophisticated as the USA.
Wrong.
Saturday afternoon. No baseball. Nothing to do. THE. PERFECT. AFTERNOON. TO VEG.
The doorbell rings. My sinister side ignores the noise and interruption. My curious side looks out the window. Curiosity wins.
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January 13th marks the one-year anniversary of Tom’s first breath with Jesus. I find it hard to believe that Tom has been gone from this earth for a whole year. Throughout the past months many of you have shared times when your grief felt so heavy and you REALLY missed Tom:
Remembering those special text messages, coffee meetings, phone calls or conversations with Tom
I am writing today as I sit at Denver International Airport awaiting my flight home to Phoenix. Airports are interesting places. So many people, so many stories. Life narratives are full of twists and turns, sometimes wonderful, sometimes tragic and yet we see God’s faithfulness and provision throughout.
Read MoreGo Hawks!
They started the season with a 3-0 and now Hawkeye fans are licking their wounds after their first loss of the season. Reality hurts.
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August. Time for the kids to go back to school, the monsoons to come and go and, for Tom, time to try to find a way to squeeze in one more trip to Flagstaff or Coronado as he waited for Iowa football to begin.
Yep. College football. Tom Shrader. Iowa Hawkeyes. 27 days until game day.
Read MoreAs I was attending chapel services earlier this week I was struck by Paul’s letter to the Philippians. Paul is writing to his dear friends in Philippi while being imprisoned, yet Paul is joyful and content knowing that Jesus “has his back.”
Paul writes, “For to me, to live is Christ, to die is gain.” (Phil 1:21)
You are receiving the email a bit later than usual. That’s by design. Saturday afternoon I attended the memorial service of someone I have known for a long time, Jodi Dennis. I felt certain that “celebration” would cause me to be reflective and I would want to share some of those thoughts with you. I was right.
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I woke up Wednesday morning, got a cup of coffee and turned on the news. I wanted to check the results of the Arizona senate race. Instead what a saw were 3 consecutive ads for “accident lawyers” who would “fight for me.” I knew officially the midterm elections were over.
Read MoreTo me for almost 5 months Wednesday means a visit from Frank Switzer. Frank serves as the lead pastor at Redemption Arcadia. Frank is smart, educated, well informed, thoughtful and articulate. Our conversations repeatedly cover the topics of, family, theology, church, movies, books and the “state of the union.”
Read More“What would you do if you won $1.6 billon?” Thankfully, over the last 3 weeks, that question has successfully muffled some of the political noise.
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Recently I made my annual pilgrimage to the cathedral dedicated to all things outdoors, the Bass Pro Shops. This store is in Mesa. To the best of recollection, I have never purchased anything at the store other that something to eat. Nonetheless, I am fascinated by the stockpile of merchandise.
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This week in anticipation of a future nomination to the Supreme Court, I felt compelled to pick up the high school yearbook from my senior year. A side note--my 50-year High school reunion is tonight. No, I am not attending.
Read MoreCertain words and phrases suddenly appear in the culture, and their presence and usage becomes widespread. Some of these expressions disappear as quickly as they arrived, like “groovy.” Others become part of the vocabulary for generations, such as “cool.”
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