The answer is like the chicken/egg question. Which did I like first? The color or the fruit. Dress me in a citrus hue and I feel truly elegant. Earliest memories are of the round fruits in that palate. Before the O’Miley line became just Miley some branch drifted down the east coast to become orange growers near Plant City, Florida. That’s all my knowledge about my granddad. That and the fact that my birth dad grew up on that farm as one of seven children and could peal an orange with the skill developed only by focused practice.

Oranges require an area that stays mostly warm during a growing season: California, Florida, and a such an area of South Louisiana. Before storing and shipping were perfected, they were a treat when there at a specific time. A Christmas memory is to dump out my stocking and find an orange lodged in the toe. The Louisiana oranges grow mainly at Belle Chasse in Plaqueimes parish, roll that carefully off your tongue. We made special trips down from Hammond to choose between Satsumas, Tangerines, and Mandarines which peel easily and the small Kumquats, an acquired taste. Seville oranges are harvested in March to June, rounding out the season. My wedding was in December. While my mother dealt with ceremony details, my daddy drove to get enough naval oranges to carefully hand one to each of seven new children joining the family, and to explain to them how grafting a tree does away with the need for seed. A fresh-squeezed glass of orange juice matches the sunrise to start a day.

Not many people rhapsodize over green beans on a stalk, yet each of you can speak of favorite fruit ripe for the gathering. The branches of an apple trees covered in red balls. Peaches that require a special tenderness not to bruise the pristine skin. Blackberries growing wild in a ditch or your being enclosed in a cage with a bucket to gather blueberries. Very Biblical fig trees with mocking birds squalking as they claim early morning picking rights. We cherish each kind and delight in the variety. We humans have a list of spirit fruit we need to cultivate individually that are just as enticing: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control. Choose what you are to grow for the harvest. Someone is waiting for your season.

By their fruit you will know them. Matthew 17:16

Not all is gloom and doom. My yardman, not really a landscaper, yet tends well, spent last week replenishing soil and mulching the beds. He doesn’t know to dig up and divide the daisies that make new clumps by growing under ground, so some areas are more crowded than I like. However, between his work and some new zinnias and a packet of spring seeds, I will have visits with Swift Blvd. walkers over the appearance of my yard as bloom time comes. Neighbors won’t even see the totally amazing volunteer bluebonnet trail I have outside the back porch from seeds blown over the fence. In a perfect world, more rain would be provided. That is out of my bailiwick, so the sprinkler needs to be on call.

I feel better and more hopeful considering what is right in my life. As last week progressed, I had to weed through what came on texts and e-mails and check the internet to make choices about voting in hopes that my actions would add some wisdom to governmental demands. A friend who is a visitor for our church for those in a hospital who need help spent time with a young woman sitting with a less than year old child with heart problems. I missed an eye doctor appointment today even after robot phone calls and answer STOP texts. I just didn’t read the date, only the time. And across an ocean and a continent, my “country ’tis of thee” began and is continuing an attack that has unknown consequences.

Humming the tune to “Nobody knows the troubles I’ve seen,” and remembering the lines to “the Assyrians came down like the wolf on the fold,” I picked up one of my to go to books. The bookmark was at a chapter called A Very Present Help. A favorite song proclaims Psalm 43:1 -3 in a rhythmic cadence that in my mind sounds like a camel driver urging his mount across the desert. Looking back there have always been troubles and we have even doubted that answers were possible. Sifting the outcomes, from somewhere has been provided a shield, a fortress, a rock, a tower, a stronghold. My dry dirt will yield the color of the coming season and my frightened heart will hear the promise of help.

The Lord will guard your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forever.

Psalm 121:8

One may have a destination in mind, but you’re not there yet. A slight difference in meaning counts. Meander around a mall before lunch checking what may turn up interesting. Wandering can have the connotation you really have no idea, yet if you take this turn something may feel familiar. When you feel lost then constraints of time, or daylight fading, or possible danger start the rise of a heart rate and the onset of panic and the unadult-like urge to call, “Mommy, where are you?” This season of ending February and moving to March creates a little of each for me. Pipes wrapped may need to stay that way through I really don’t expect another freeze. Papers for house taxes and the larger tax return get mixed with the wrong stack. I have an urge to order seeds for summer yet the right catalogue and page seem elusive and is now the right time? What gives the confirmation I am on the best path to move on with this year.

Some days I want to throw caution to the wind and “follow the yellow brick road.” Spring is usually like this and all will be well. However, it is nice to be next to that map with a red dot labeled You Are Here and the surroundings do look familiar. One big arrow gives encouragement unless it points up. Really, is fly away the solution? I’ve been in puzzled groups at a crossroads to have the loudest and bravest proclaim, “My gut says to go this way,” and march off sure that the rest of us will follow. The possibility of advice you can trust may be the solution unless it ends with the phrase, “You can’t miss it.” The most comforting journey is made like first graders leaving their classroom to go to the library. They travel in pairs and have a hand to hold.

It always amazes me that in this technological age, a source of rescuing may often include words like shepherd, rod, and staff for a generation that knows sheep only in a petting zoo. We do meander through parts of our lives, wander in a few wildernesses, and look around to realize we are lost. Then we don’t need a guardian angel as much as a caring, watchful shepherd who pulls us back from the edge of a crevice or fights off the lions of confusion that wait to attack. So February is short and March will blow strong winds toward Easter where we will hear those words again that guide our way.

 “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me—

John 10:14

If at once you don’t succeed, try again. Obviously even I master pronunciation, spelling correctly takes focused effort. Yet, my book of the week is 219 pages of research that proves the definition of that word. Some connections operating at the same time can control a variety of happenings in life, from meshing with that amazing best friend, to assuring a successful auction, to successfully directing the decision of a jury. How this happens is explained in variable degrees of understanding for me in Why W-E Click by Kate Murphy, a friend of a friend. Though the psychological terms for some research conducted over years to define interpersonal synchrony did not find a place in my vocabulary, around me were examples I truly understood.

An accolade of the time is to be a BFF, which all teenagers immediately translate and cherish. Not everyone enters this sacred portal. Evidently, within 30 seconds of meeting a person, one notices clues that affirm a special closeness will develop while in the same time you would leave a different person to refresh a drink you don’t need at the table across the room. A grown son has shared the tug to his heart as he has learned this week of the fatal illness of a 12 year canine companion. This particular dog has an affinity to recognize needs of those around her. When I visit, I am the oldest and weakest, and she always places herself between me and any possible harm.

One of the most amazing togetherness bonds develops when a group presents itself as one: a military unit or a dance group. However, even they can reach out beyond themselves. I was at a local chamber orchestra concert last week. Before the orchestra began the performance of Dvorak’s From the New World symphony, the conductor asked the orchestra to sing unaccompanied the theme from the Largo movement, a short melody that has been given the words “Going Home.” Then he turned and requested a re-singing of “Going Home” by all in the room. Age and training notwithstanding, a palatable feeling of we are one encompassed the concert hall. The above mentioned book has a summary on p. 15 defining this moment: “We are a species that has evolved to synchronize physiologically, emotionally, and behaviorally; and we find it immensely pleasurable when it occurs.”

Encourage one another. Build one another up. I Thessalonians 5:11

As my one true love used to say, “It’s like taking a drink from a fire hose.” I can’t ignore this day coming up even if I know zilch about St. Valentine without research. I checked enough to see celebrating love is expected to add $29.1 billion dollars to the economic income! I have sent two specific emails and five homemade cards, but the remainder is from candy, cards, jewelry, flowers, and the possibility of 6 million proposals. Love may be the ultimate of positive emotion and yet we use the word to cover everything from our feelings about the smells emitting from a fresh pizza, to a tear shed as a small child declares, “I wuv u,” to spiritual elation when we stand in a group as all proclaim, “God so loved the world!”

Etymologically. let’s start with four lower case letters that are used to identify most inanimate objects that give us pleasure. There is really no connection to that red heart shaped logo that isn’t a bit like the life pumping blood organ in our bodies. Those four letter just mean, “Gee, I like this,” and delight in whatever whenever that specific this gives one pleasure. Capitalize letter one and usually another person becomes envolved from a teenager carrying a torch and stumbling over his own feet in the presence of a giggly girl to developing a friendship that provides guarded conversations without fear of misunderstanding. The grand finale is all caps when a Roman Eros, forerunner of cherubimic Cupid, fires arrows and leaves a strong feeling for a person or commitment leading to the a heart racing moment daily in your life. That emotion paves the way for proposals, a caregiving situation, or the adoption of a faith as a foundation stone for decisions and actions.

Difficult as it may be at times, one can’t always live on the top of the mountain or at a pinnacle of experience. I will still love the pansies on my front porch that survived the freeze. My fifty year friend who seems to appear at scattered moments when needed deserves my Love. Some of my LOVE has been given to people in my past and is shared now with a close group. A LOVE choice for a tenant of faith in all caps has been given to me as a recipient and to replenish my supply. Specifics may vary, yet this is what each day requires.

Do everything in love. 1 Corinthians 16:14

For certain ones of us who have chosen Christian as our religious designation and, in their own interpretation for others, the theme of belonging somewhere gets a little muddy. My point of view thinks Eden was the only determined place until the situation got sticky and Adam and Eve went forth. Years later Abraham was sent to a land he knew not of and settling in took adjustments. A drought and survival involved moving a whole nation to Egypt until they had to move on again later. A slight religious connection was involved in the Mayflower landing in 1620 on soil that was already inhabited by a native race of people. That shipload fought and reorganized their space over 100 years till they had a new country that supposedly was theirs. My Kelly relatives fled the potato famine in the 1700’s to work their way down the east coast of that new county to be dirt farmers in Florida and grant me the right to claim citizenship.

Instead of dealing with a person in a headline today, these are individuals who made their own path to be citizens who impacted my life. One is a gracious young woman whom I taught in 7th grade when her mother had a green card. She herself is an impressive teacher, yet she wrote of applying for citizenship and the strain of waiting at that time, “that the form was filled out correctly and for someone to talk to her who saw her as a person.” A man who has cut my hair for 25 years and is the age of my elder son . His mother was a Vietnamese widow and he was #5 of 10 children she managed to send forth to become Americans before all here sent back for her. Over 80 members of that family gather from airline pilots to store owners. What would I do without my man of all trades whose grandmother brought him into Texas “to amount to something,” He learned English in a Barbara Bush school in the Heights, has raised two fine daughters with college educations, and dropped everything to come put grab bars in my bathroom when I brought an ailing husband home from the hospital.

As part of my education I learned the story of the Statue of Liberty rising against the skyline on Ellis Island. I have ridden a boat out and felt the relief of arriving and what might be possible from that moment on. I know the poem. Now, does that torch need to hold a handkerchief to wipe tears from her eyes? I go back to Eden. Yes, I am here with documentation of approved residence now, yet this space is not my final dwelling place. Two validations are true. In my faith, I sing a song, “I am a stranger here within a foreign land.” Second, while here, I am admonished to remember these words. They are a part of my journey.

When a foreigner lives with you in your land, don’t take advantage of him. Treat the foreigner the same as a native. Love him like one of your own. Remember that you were once foreigners in Egypt.

Leviticus 17:34 The Message

Don’t be disappointed. No freeze drama. Those of you who know where this originates know that Texas along with almost half America has just come through an unprecedented spell of cold weather with all the upsets and problems that go along with extreme low temperatures. If we sat in a circle in my living room, conversation would sound like a can you top this sharing of stories. Animals missed daily walks, pipes froze or water was cut off and not available, yards resembled real snow banks or approximated fake ones because of the coverings of white protection cloth. Maybe the most upsetting tales were leaving on a trip to have the plane be grounded in a strange place for two days. You may have been able to disembark, but your suitcase stayed on the runway. However, breathtaking and maybe expensive as those narratives are, I want to remember a different set of stories.

The support in the days of 9/11 was Mr. Rogers in his sweater quoting his mother, “Look for the helpers. There are always helpers.” With the first whiff of climate change, various groups from the utility companies to charity organizations sent suggestions from preparation (Pets, Protection, and People) to a list of free shelters if that was a needed option. I had one last social occasion on my calendar and a fellow attendee offered to transport. My family in town was the first to check on me with a son-in-law getting extra bonus points for coming to wrap faucets and to turn off a garage shower which had burst and flooded the last big freeze. A daughter helped with groceries on hand and promised to even bring a 4-wheel drive over icy road to rescue if electricity failed. Neighbors on either side called to check on my plans along with a friend half a subdivision away. I do a Zoom lunch with older friends. Wednesday last week every one had a back up offer in place, just in case. Forever gratitude has been held for years for the strangers who opened their house to rescue a branch of our family leaving Colorado late one night trying to outrun a storm.

By the time this is read, I hope you have weathered the storm, regrouped, and have taken time to offer thanks for warm bodies that helped the first of the week. They were part of God’s gift of survival promised in verses ahead of time. Someone may even be remembering your name with thanksgiving. “Two are better than one….for if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow.” Ecclesiastes 4:9 -10. “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!” Psalm 133:1,”Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.” 1Peter 4:9.

Biblical blessing through it all, to have heard or to have said. “You OK? Can I help?”

I had been sorting a collection of comic strips on oxymorons, combining two words that really don’t fit together, ala jumbo shrimp. Then my reading had “an extraordinary day,” a descriptive for more than you expected. I mulled for a moment. Is extraordinary more than just adding a prefix to what comes morning to evening and creates extra ordinary. Extra ordinary means to me that all turns out as planned. Breakfast is prepared, carpool loaded, and a shopping list is already made out. No surprises, no disasters, just an even flow of what you expected. Change the accent to extraordinary and it becomes, “I never knew that was waiting in the wings!”

Once I paid attention, I saw what comes to pass can change the whole tone of the day. Sunday I made my usual journey to an 11:00 church meeting. The ordinaries of my day are very slow at the beginnings of the mornings, and I was feeling a little more less capable than usual. Slowly walking down a corridor, I heard a cheery voice call my name. It was the helper who cleans bathrooms. “I hope you’re staying warm this cold day.” Amazingly, as I answered back, I was able to pick up my step with more purpose. Monday, my daughter and I made a regular trip we schedule to do bloodwork, except it was MLK Day and labs were closed. By some fluke we could get in the parking lot and no barricades would raise to let us out. This was not ordinary at all until security on guard came with a key and smiled as he waved us through. Unplanned, astonishing, remarkable moments.

The word not only describes what happens, but also what we make of it. Re-reading my journal from May 3, 1999, is a list of some things I usually do, yet they must have been extra for reviewing that day. Centered in a page was a label: Extraordinarily Ordinary. To dig holes for plants.To make the bed on Saturday. To leave a clean sink for the next morning. To put the top on the myonaisse jar. To brush my short stubby hair. To fill my car with gas. To let me be a lark even if you’re an owl. These scatter silver dust on lead gray occasions. Wow! What dusted your ordinary day?

The Lord has done great things for us,
    and we are filled with joy. Psalm 123:6 NIV

Surely I knew of the history yet the specifics were never important to me. South Louisiana marches, or in this case, runs to its own drummer, and Mardi Gras filled the need for crowd gathering excitement. Back to what I did know. In a BC era Athens was in a war and needed re-enforcements. In place of no technology, a runner named Pheidippides made two inspiring runs to carry news. First one was 153 miles to Sparta to request help and then after Athens eked out a win, the second run was 26 miles to the Acropolis to announce loosely translated, “We are the winners!” before dropping dead. The second run over years has spread across nations to various cities to entice competitors in the 26.2 run. Athletes train and amass a list of when, where, and how long they have participated. As far as I know, none have breasted the final tape calling forth the last line of Browning’s commemorative poem by gasping, “Athens is saved,” and then dropping dead.

The Marathon is this week’s topic because transportation in Houston took modern GPS to survive Sunday’s traveling demands. Beginning at 4:00 am, a sequence of cones and barrels were laid out to close off cross intersections for the 26.2 miles of street running. If you lived on the east side or the far west of the city and needed only to travel farther in either of those directions, your life may have gone smoothly. Otherwise, you probably joined viewers to watch a total of 30,000 runners stream past for a half and a whole race. Supposedly, areas were to be opened up at a specified time, but either someone didn’t get the message or the walkie-talkies weren’t working. Noontime came before the circle became a route of travel again.

Non-athletic that I was and age I am now, the enticement of the race did not come near me. In the back of my mind, though, I am aware that before ever running, the commitment has to be to training. I check my Garmin watch during the day to make sure that number of steps toward 1 mile, a long way from 26.2, is increasing. After pneumonia last winter that’s progress, and I have a goal of strong round 2 miles by the end of 2026. Each part of our lives takes practice from legwork to deeds of kindness to wisdom in choices. We work to do well for ourselves and for those who line the way and cheer us on.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses,….strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees.

Hebrews 12:1, 12

A side benefit of teaching for me was being allowed to go on nature trips. Just knowing and seeing animals made me feel better. With a little trepidation, I have run two fingers down a snake someone else was holding. A hedgehog stretches out and then curls into a protective ball. Birds on display are nothing like robins hopping over my yard. A hawk curves his talons into the handler’s leather protected wrist and arches his head majestically. In Boston’s Museum of Natural Science, an owl perched motionless, staring straight ahead. Slowly, he moved his entire head to stare behind him, swiveled back and around past his other shoulder. No mice in sight. Each part of him was designed to be a night time hunter: eyes that adjusted to dim light, a head to move over spaces around him, and wings made for gliding silently in attack without a flap of warning.

Regardless of your age, find a copy of Jane Yolen’sOwl Moon. The time has come for a young girl to go out with her dad on a cold night to find an owl. Her dad stops at times to make a hooting call with no response. Her brothers have told her sometimes there is an owl; sometimes not. You have to be quiet and you have to be brave. When the call is eventually answered and the owl glides in silently to settle on a branch and stare at them, she remembers a final word. When you go owling, you need hope. I have read this to eighth graders to have them sit in silence at the end.

The only Biblical injunction about owls is they live mostly solitary in wild places. and they are not good to eat. At times in my life, I feel an affinity for owls. Three is about their largest grouping, yet the identifying term is a Parliament, representing wisdom as they may gather to discuss important matters. Darkness does not thwart them. It is an element that does not hedge them in. They accomplish what they set out to do without a lot of noise or upheaval. Along with everything else from lilies of the field to birds of the air, God knows what they need and cares for them. I could go for that!

Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!

Luke 12:24