Tag: silence

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Nothing By Chance

23 March 2024

As I waited for an arrival home tonight, I knew friends were due over for a catch-up visit, so I decided to bake something. After some deliberation I finally settled on something quick, easy, tried and tested.  I had a recipe I hadn’t used in years – Tahini oatmeal cookies – 3 ingredients.  Tahini, brown sugar, oatmeal and a dash or two of cold water. Mix & bake. I had found the recipe on one return trip from Italy in a flight magazine. They reminded me of yet another coincidence- a kind, soft-demeanored priest who used to preside over an Eastern rite church that I attended many years ago. He baptized family members. When in the midst of dark days, no insurance coverage, teaching layoff without recompense or recognition, and nowhere to turn, he was one of three good Samaritan souls who entered into the swirling fears to be of comfort. As I stirred the batter, my mind recalled my 3 year old daughter pushing the 911 phone buttons to relay information from me to emergency services so that an incapacitating compound fracture could be potentially healed. Without question, this priest arrived and took care of anything that needed to be arranged.


This Middle-Eastern priest helped me through some very dark days. He was shunned in later years from the church. I had heard rumors… But none of that mattered then, and as I reflect, it matters even less now… The kindness and compassion he always gave meant more to me and I am sure to so many others when feeling alone and confused, unloved and lost.

When we care for and about others, a part of their culture is also shared with you. Growing up, I had the gift of learning about differences – ethnicities, cultures, mannerisms, preferences, lifestyles…almost an introduction to an ever-changing universe of transformation. To find the beauty in diversity is to appreciate creation, to be open to Love wherever It is made manifest.

The spontaneity of a tahini cookie recipe brought all those memories of a kind, generous, loving priest willing to care flooding back to me.  I pray for him wherever he is, as I am grateful that he and others reach into darkness to bring others Light, Peace, and direction.

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Under the Leaves

26 September 2023

An urging restlessness returned my thoughts to the usual mental debate for this autumn Tuesday. “I know no one there. No one knows me. Should I go?” Then I began thinking of New York City in the 1920s and 1930s.

Images of my father’s Brooklyn neighborhood popped in my mind. Some of these faded photographs I managed to find and tuck in a few envelopes before I left what I had called home. Now they flipped through my thoughts. I had heard and answered the appeal for tombstone contributions from an Italian-American community. Now, I felt a connection to this unknown someone who chose the moral grace of “doing the right thing” — Here is the story of Pietro Pete Panto. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/15/nyregion/pete-panto-docks-mob.html

Here was Pietro, buried unmarked, unrecognized, not far from where I now quietly live. Pete — standing, saying no to corruption, even in the face of violence, and upholding his own moral compass in favor of workers’ struggles. At another historical time, almost 100 years ago, when honesty seemed scarce, Panto remained steadfast to model workers’ collective conscience of honest travail and its rewards. How much yet how little things change! I spoke to people in attendance – open, focused, welcoming – waiting with umbrellas prepared for the threats of a downpour.

Before I left the house, I debated whether to buy flowers. A quick visual survey of the backyard revealed one perfect red rosebud, and several purple wildflowers, palm-like fronds, and plenty of greenery. I gathered the flowers and whispered a prayer for the guidance to do the right thing, and to brave the conviction to follow those whispers.

And when ready to leave, I returned to the car, shuffling through brown, decaying leaves over rows of graves. By chance, I brushed some brown leaves off one of the foot-stones and looking up, read and received the message to recognize the synchronicity and serendipity of this afternoon.

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Genuine Labor

4 September 2023

Sometimes allowing silent actions to prompt observation, thought and experience succeed more than engaging in conversation.

Ripened grape tomatoes on the vine, small but particularly sweet this year made a smooth sauce for lunch on a cauliflower pizza crust. Tiny green zucchini, sliced thin and pan-roasted made the circular design. Finally, fresh mozzarella, leftover from yesterday’s weekly stop at the local Italian deli dotted the decorative, enhanced Margherita with a touch of basil.

All remains quiet as people recede from today’s heat & humidity. The earth and grass are parched in places, despite watering every other day. Many messages rise up for those who seek them, with accompanying thoughts.

Labor Day 2023 recipe: crushed garlic, evoo, blended garden tomatoes however small, drop in a few fresh basil leaves shredded and simmer your pizza sauce – dotting with fresh (leftover) mozzarella, garden baby zucchini slices on cauliflower crust. Bake at 400 for 10-12 minutes.

Incomparable, unprocessed taste gives simplicity, authenticity and work together — to make a pure, healthy point, understood through experience on Labor Day 2023.

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Nature’s Search for Equity

April 15, 2023

Learn to be silent and recognize yourself as a humble part of Nature & you may be given gifts. Today through an unseasonable spring, and after a dry but safe winter, struggling white blossoms strain their petals to appear on cherry and Goji bushes. Though not as many as in years past.

Alone? Mastermind? Or are we an integral part of this intricately woven Pattern of Life?

Feel the gift and strength of being part, however small yet essential, of such a glorious Plan and relinquish the fantasy of control to mutual respect, care, stewardship, awe & admiration for all creation connected to you.

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