Hello dear friends,

I saw on the news this morning that the shooter in the Boulder grocery store killed ten people. I am 45 years old now, I have grown children, one of whom moved out into his own place this weekend, another of whom is working as a student teacher and going to college in another state. I have close family and friends everywhere. I have seen so much, after years of deep thinking I know more, I have learned and processed new and important things, and so maybe these are some of the reasons why it hit me harder this time, learning of another mass shooting.

Those people were just like you and me, doing what we always do, running errands and getting groceries, but they……. were shot at, traumatized, killed. It doesn’t make any sense to me, how a beautiful spring day can turn so ugly. And yet, if you read the stories you learn that the victims came together in crisis to help each other the best they could. You learn that a police officer sacrificed his life.

Is there nowhere safe anymore? Was there ever any place safe?

When confronted by the confusion of such unanswerable questions, I find myself stripped bare of everything but what I love the most; my people (friends and family), spirituality, nature, and home (my purpose).

So, because I was able, I told my people I loved them, I went outside for a long walk, and I went in the kitchen and made a cake. Cakes are typically for celebrations but today was a day for showing love.

I gathered eggs for the cake; produced for us daily by a flock of feathered hen-friends. I gave one to the dog (who knows that he has to drop it, not on the soft lawn, but on the driveway, so it will crack open and he can eat it) and then put the rest in the house before going for a walk.

I stopped and rested by the stream and thought about the beaver. I wished I could see him. How very industrious he is, chewing down each and every tree that he is able to. This stick was standing up, leaning against a large tree (large trees are safe from beavers), it’s bark entirely removed by the teeth of the beaver who ate it like corn from a cob. (I decided I’m bringing back the handkerchief.)

Then, my feet led me to a spot in the field where some scat lay. I noticed that it appeared to be entirely fur. As I stood there looking down at it, I saw something within the fur that looked otherwise. So I took a stick, knelt down, and started poking around.

Soon I had the fur-poo pulled apart, and the contents that I had discovered, in my pocket.

I headed to the stream to wash my hands over and over in the ice-cold water.

The forest on early spring days is so………gray.

As is the grass.

And what’s this I see so far from home? A spoon.

A spoon from my own kitchen! To have children is to be constantly surprised one way or the other.

Thus, I went home with a spoon in one pocket, a hanky in another, and poo-bits in the third.

But before I got there, I found a green bottle and hung it in a tree.

Every walk I go on is fascinating. And I realized something, although I have a second home in Georgia, I feel like my best self and most inspired self in my dear New England.

I emptied my pocket onto a piece of brown paper bag. Furry teeth and bones. Someone needs to tell that animal that teeth are indigestible.

From that to baking. I was able to use up six eggs on my cake. By the time it had cooled Rich was in the house, the boys were home from school, and Sarah and Brittnee were home from the apartment (where they hung out today, to wait for a couch to be delivered). Therefore, I had an audience watching me frost the cake. “What are you going to write on it, Mom?” they cried.

“Just watch and see,” I said.

love-cake,
with all their names