This week I went to Florida with some friends for our break. Four of us kept striking up conversations with the people around us: wait staff, shop keepers, cleaning staff, folks fishing off the pier. The fifth of our party was disgusted with us, and said she didn't care about people's stories, she was never going to see them again or think about them again. It struck me so odd because I do think about people for years to come with whom I have had a momentary chance meeting, like the woman in a pueblo market in New Mexico in 1969, and the lady with the talking birds, a man who offered to give me a newborn pig when I rode along on a ministerial call with my father in about '67, the boy I observed as we waited in line to go up in the Washington Monument in 1972. I do indeed think about these chance encounters over and over through the years. Imagine, then how a friend like you has impacted my life. I think of you whenever I see one of those message hearts for Valentine's day, and when someone sighs, or when serving communion and the crumbs sog up all the juice, and when a child visits our worship without parents. Of course in your art as I review and reread your blog posts, or look back through the pictures from your calendar, and our trip to Liberia. How fleeting, then are all our memories? One lifetime? One and a half, as we share with our children? Or longer if my memory makes me more empathic, more accepting, more tolerant, which makes me a better mother, grandmother, friend, and hands some shadow of memory on to a next generation.

Your name is written on my heart! It is written in a very special place.

Your name is painted in my heart for sure! The most wonderful boss I have ever had the privilege to work with! I am really enjoying your blog and photography!