Many people started new hobbies or interests during the lockdown. They learned how to sew; they made home improvements; they even watched new genres of shows. I myself had two new obsessions: plants and mystery novels. I now have over 37 plants in my home office. It is a veritable forest in here, and I […]
“To wonder is to stand in the towering shadow of God however frightened we are of our own smallness. Like Moses, let us pause at the bushes that burn. Like Tomas, let us bend for a closer look at Christ—even if, paradoxically, it’s doubt that reaches to touch his side. Let us have certainty when […]
We wait under a warm October sun—in a long line of anxious and eager pretenders. Princesses, pirates, and Baby Yoda wiggle away in excitement as parents corral them back to their designated, socially distanced marks. In front of us stand a pair of brilliantly-costumed frappuccinos (pool noodles attached to headbands for straws = brilliant) and […]
Her intense gaze met mine, or so I believed. When she turned toward the audience the feathers of her tail responded in a dance of their own, winding around her slender form. She wasn’t a ballet dancer on a stage; she was the exotic bird, emerging from her cage to capture my imagination. Time ceased […]
I bristled when I received a message from an editor at a publishing house asking if I was working on any projects. “I can’t write a book now,” I thought. “I’m still living in this messy space of transition between Asia and America, between old dreams dying and not yet discovering the new. Standing on […]
In the opening of the film Bull Durham, the camera pans over an empty baseball field at sunset, while one of the main characters, Annie, says in a voiceover, “I believe in the church of baseball….There are 108 beads in a Catholic rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I heard that, […]
My friend Melissa has a way of being kind that also makes me think. We were out for coffee, talking about books. Specifically: about my anxiety about wanting to read more. By most measures, I read a lot, but with the advent of smart phones and parenthood, I read less then I used to. Recently, […]
For a three-month stretch when I was seven or eight, I tried to learn how to pray. When I couldn’t sleep, I’d pull a children’s prayer book down from the shelf and move it to the crack of light that shone in from the hallway. I opened it up to the Lord’s Prayer and read […]