I have lived a lifetime in just the last week. I’ve stood by my elderly mother‘s deathbed, keeping vigil as she drew her last breath. My siblings and I have mourned Mom’s passing, celebrated her life, and sorted through her most special treasures. After weeks away, I have finally returned to my own home, to…

What a strange week this has been at the Spencer home. We knew for several months that this was coming, and put it off as long as we humanely could. Last Tuesday evening, we said goodbye to our dearly beloved pet, Kelsey. She was a German Shepard mix whom we found at a pet adoption…

Dr. Mueller was my organ performance professor for 4 years in the early 90’s. He taught me to make Bach’s music dance, to soar with the elegant beauty of Mendelssohn’s melodies, to engineer the compositions of Cesar Franc so that my small hands could perform the music of this giant of a musician who also…

This weekend we must say a final goodbye to David Adkins. I’ve been working on this goodbye for years, dreading it, avoiding it, running from it, trying to make sense of it. I have thought many times about composing a greeting card for him and his family, but words have failed me over and over…

I have just finished reading a new book by author and Duke professor, Kate Bowler. Her book, Everything Happens for a Reason and Other Lies I Have Enjoyed, is an honest accounting of her recent and on-going struggle with colon cancer. She spoke of the “gospel of prosperity” which seems to have infected much of…

One of the oddities of Parkinson’s Disease is that it messes with one’s sense of smell. Yes, it’s less of an offense to one’s way of life than tremors or some of the other more odious issues, yet it’s still an often-inconvenient loss. For example, gas companies put a noxious odor in the gas that…

When I was young, say 40 years ago, I did a good bit of public speaking.  I even partially paid for grad school by speaking (preaching) at churches on the weekends.  Somehow, as I got older, that gift of speaking got channeled in different ways, mainly in the classroom and in the public performances by…