Woodchuck Waits – Dec. 1, 2022
“Deep in his burrow he’s safe from other mouths. It’s his own hunger he has to escape. Winter has wiped bare his vegetarian table. He would starve if he stayed awake. Asleep—a sleep so deep his heart barely beats and his body cools to nearly the temperature of ice—he expends almost no energy. Only at […]
Honey Bees Wait – Nov. 30, 2022
“If they’re here—all females in a winter hive—they’re clustered together inside (an oak tree), queen at the heart of their sisterhood. The fine, transparent wings they beat hard in summer’s heat—a constant buzzing fan to keep the hive from cooking—they hold, now, folded and still. The tiny muscles to which those wings are attached shiver. […]
Chickadee Waits – Nov. 29, 2022
“A chickadee on a winter night burns through all the calories it ate during the day. Before dawn, as soon as there’s light enough to see, the chickadee flutters out, famished, its tiny brain intent on seeds. Tiny, its brain, but bigger now, in Advent, than in spring… Inside that black skullcap his hippocampus is […]
Waiting: The Seedbed of Hope
Everywhere I go, people are busy with their cell phones: scrolling through emails, muttering messages, playing games or watching some video snippet. Filling time with our cell phones is now possible, and so we do it because others are doing it. On the Metro, in line at the grocery store, or sitting in a doctor’s […]
