As 1992 dawned, I was certain I had descended to one of the darkest times of my life to that point. For a variety of reasons, I could no longer continue serving the church I had pastored for the previous 4 years, and December 31, 1991, was my last day…
Aside from a swollen left hand, Day 2 dawned with an air of hopefulness. My sister and I were about 10 miles into our planned 273-mile adventure on Vermont’s Long Trail—the footpath in the wilderness. The previous two Pastor’s Page installments cover the months of preparation up to the actual…
365 miles in 12 months. On foot. On a trail of some kind (not neighborhood sidewalks or the mall). “The Hiker’s 365,” it’s called, and was the first My Adventure Challenge we signed up for. Initially, we launched this challenge in November 2021 with the goal of completing it one…
To be brutally honest, I am not much of a horticulturist. So many times, we’ve been on a hike somewhere—doesn’t matter, desert, forest, alpine, meadow—we see a plant or tree and wonder what kind it is. I’d like to be more adept in the field, but like anything else, it…
In my brief six-plus decades, not much stands out as particularly strange. I may be thought strange, but as far as strange things happening to me, they’ve been few and far between. In fact, I tried to scan the memory banks of my childhood, I couldn’t come up with much…
After my recent episode at the end of a Sunday morning service (I wrote about it last week), it was decided I needed a break. At first, I balked at the word “need.” I mean, a vacation is always nice, but need suggests some kind of deficiency. When I got…
“Here we are as in olden days…” Are we? In many ways, we are. Christmas rolls around again as it has for centuries. Hasn’t always been so universally celebrated; nevertheless, no one alive in the western hemisphere remembers when it wasn’t celebrated. The other night, we went for a Christmas…
While working in my study, I usually have Calm Radio playing in the background, as it is right now. Featuring dozens of genre channels, Calm Radio’s niche is expressed in the name—the music isn’t blaring, driving, and overpowering. Some channels have vocals, but I don’t think I’ve ever listened to…
If I wanted to simplify things greatly, I’d say the difference between Mrs. Hughes and Miss Case had to do with appreciation. Mrs. Hughes was my 6th-grade teacher at Lincoln Elementary School in Niles, Ohio. When I walked into her classroom on the first day of school in September 1969,…
Ever tried sleeping on a hard-as-a-rock pillow and thought you’d never get to sleep? My better half has never been backpacking before. Done many a day hike with me through the years, but never with a 25 lb. pack on her back. Never setting up a tiny, lightweight tent at…
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