Easter morning

There was a series of four photos that hung on my parents’ wall when I was growing up, all taken on one day, Easter morning, when I was about 5 years old. They showed my sister and me in our brand-new Easter dresses, posing with two friends, a sister and brother who lived up the road from us–the girl my sister’s age and the boy mine. I remember one picture of all four of us, and I think there was one of just my sister and me; I don’t remember the details of the other two. Continue reading

Dreams can come true

It’s Saturday night, and I just watched the Loyola (Chicago) Ramblers lose their semifinal NCAA basketball game to Michigan. These guys were Chicago’s team, and they became America’s team by ignoring their #11 seed and taking down opponent after opponent on their way to the Final Four.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say no one actually thought they could get to the Final Four. But they did, and they made their 98-year-old team chaplain, Sister Jean, America’s favorite nun—hell, America’s favorite college basketball figure, period—in the process.

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Easter Eve

It’s called Holy Saturday, though I’ve never fully understood why it’s supposed to be holy. Supposedly Christ descended into Hell during the day that passed between his death and resurrection, and somehow released the righteous from imprisonment (or whatever) there, but I remain unclear just why they were there in the first place, being righteous. Surely there must have been some concept of limbo or purgatory to keep the righteous out of Hell? Continue reading

Online Book Club: The South Side

I’m pleased and honored to have a new book review published on Escape Into Life, this one looking at Chicago reporter Natalie Moore’s 2016 book The South Side. I finished this book back on Martin Luther King Day, which seemed fitting, and I mentioned it briefly in this space at the time. The new piece on EIL is more complete—and also written mostly in complete sentences, so I’m right proud of myself.

One suggestion I make in the review is that The South Side would be a great book to read with a discussion group. It’s chockfull of thought-provoking interviews, data and personal stories, and raises a lot of serious issues that deserve discussion. I actually wrote down a few questions to ponder as I was reading it, and I offer those up here for anyone who interested in fueling a discussion. Bring these questions along with your own to your book group’s meeting—or, if you’re not reading The South Side with a book group, offer your answers for discussion here. Continue reading

Not yet morning

Dawn breaks sometime in the future.

For now, I lie awake, insistent thrum of traffic washing up against my window, one unseen bird calling out, anticipating the day.

“Do worms hear?” I wonder as this bird (whose call I do not recognize, somewhere between cardinal and crow) breaks the pre-dawn calm with a repeated cheep … cheep … cheep. Does the early bird go hungry if it doesn’t remain quiet?