Category Archives: Spiritual

Sanctuary

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 13, 2026- Granddaughter had a tough day today. Our little Capricorn had to take not one, but two, trips in the car, so being in the car seat-one of her least favourite activities-was just part of the agenda. The other stuff was more of a personal nature-the normal ups and downs of being a newborn. This house, though, is her sanctuary-and Grandfather’s arms are a bower. None of us here will let anything wreck her day, and if she has, as her father occasionally had, a tough time, I will set anything else aside and just hold and rock her.

When Hana is upset, and I have her with me, she will look me in the eye while crying, almost as if hoping to see and feel being understood. That, she is, and the group of us will figure out what is bothering her, either from her physical cues or by noting anything that has happened, during feeding or elimination, that might be causing her distress.

Every human being deserves sanctuary. The sanctuary for the innocent is protection from harm. The sanctuary for the criminal is due process. In 2016, Donald Trump asked one fair question: “Where was the sanctuary for Kate Steinle?” She was the young lady who was killed by a violent man who was in the United States illegally. Kate Steinle was in a place for people on holiday. She, and everyone else there, deserved a safe environment.

The same is true for every other person who has been killed or assaulted by someone filled with rage. They deserved a safe place. Think about that, before commenting on whether anyone going about their business deserved death or injury, for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Fire Blankets and Urban Walking

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Posted by on in children, Community, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 12, 2026- My order of three fire suppression blankets came today. These blankets offer considerable protection in the event of a house fire, so we have one on each floor and a third in the laundry room, next to the garage. They are easier to use than a fire extinguisher, though hopefully we won’t need to use them at all.

I spent a good part of this afternoon in the nearby city of McKinney, which is our county seat, and the location of a KIA dealership. I first caught a Lyft to downtown, not being sure just how far it was, or how difficult it might be to get there from the dealer. Finding the main bookstore closed, I walked around the interesting downtown, and settled in at Collective Coffee, which reminds me, favourably, of Prescott’s Wild Iris or Century Lounge. I can see myself frequenting Collective, when in McKinney on one errand or another.

After indulging in a latte and slice of coffee cake, I checked the distance back to the dealership. It was 1.5 miles, mostly along a pleasant residential street, so I made the walk. The houses are largely of Victorian vintage, many with turrets. There are a few businesses in midtown, but the mini-malls wait until closer to U.S. 75. I am accustomed to navigating walking paths near major thoroughfares, though, and this area has crosswalks that allow for safe passage over highway approaches, just shy of the actual on-ramps. I was back at the dealership in less than a half-hour.

The service department caught up with a few recalls and gave me a schedule for maintenance. It’s good to be at a KIA dealer, after four years of winging it.

Back home, all were glad to see me. Hana relaxed her head on my shoulder and let out a big sigh, as I helped her into sleep mode tonight. Grandpa will not let her down.

Edith Renfrow Smith

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Posted by on in collaborating, Community, Historical, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 10, 2026- She largely minded her own business, focusing on getting an education-even in the aftermath of Plessy vs.Ferguson, and then on educating others, for over forty years, and being vindicated by the decision in Brown vs. Board of Education. Edith Renfrow Smith was a product of small town Iowa, and in fact was the only African-American at her school in Grinnell and the first at its highly-regarded college, which she graduated in 1937. Edith died yesterday, in her adopted home of Chicago. She was 111.

Mrs. Smith was a mentor to the great jazz pianist, Herbie Hancock, who was her neighbour in Chicago. She gently encouraged him to attend Grinnell College, which he did, turning a dual interest in engineering and music into a career of innovation in piano jazz. She also met several prominent Black-Americans, from Gwendolyn Brooks to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., during her years in Chicago.

I look at the lives of people like Mrs. Smith, who welcomed guests into her home, almost until the day she passed, as examples of how one can live life to the full, through a mix of civic engagement and maintaining a modicum of privacy. As the granddaughter of a runaway slave who himself built a new life in the free state of Iowa, she found a love for education and self-improvement were instilled in her. She passed those on to her two daughters and to her grandchildren. She also passed along the philosophy of greeting everyone with a smile. It was important to her that this small act was the basis for making the world a better place.

The balance set forth by Mrs. Smith is as fine a model to follow into advanced age, as any I have seen.

Wondering about Clouds

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Family, Hiking and Nature, impediments, Inspiration, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual

January 9, 2025- In my early evening time with Hana, she was gazing up at the clouds and the tree in our front yard. The big upper windows allow plenty of room for a child to look up and out, especially when wrapped in the safety of loving arms. I told her about how clouds give trees life-giving water, just like we are feeding her life-giving milk. She continued to look at the scene outside. Her pre-lingual brain is, no doubt, saving images, with repeat observation and hearing similar words with regard to what she sees.

I wonder, too, about clouds, though of a different kind. The mental clouds we use to “shield” ourselves from the reality of things outside or even from our own shadow selves-misgivings, shrill self-condemnation, lack of impulse control, can be useful in the sense of giving time to process those negative elements and let them flow out. Held on too tightly, they can be energy-sapping and unnecessarily limiting.

That is the wisdom of nature: Clouds come, drop their load of rain or snow, and move along-so long as we,in our rush to make a profit or craving to hold onto ideas that have lost their efficacy, do not continue with policies and behaviours that interrupt the water cycle. Nature ebbs and flows well enough on its own. We have the choice of learning to flow with it, as many ancient cultures did, or of acting in arrogance and trying to supersede the natural rhythm.

Drawn to the Light

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Family, impediments, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 8, 2026- Hana and I had an hour of just the two of us, this evening. The rest of the family went to an Asian market, so grandmother could select foods with which to properly make some Korean dishes, which she’s wanted to fix since coming here.

Our darling girl took in her surroundings, as she does most of the time that she’s awake and not feeding. She watched me carefully, as I told her about the world being a largely beautiful place and that there will be many good things in her life, as well as challenging things. I told her that I would be there for her for as long as I am intended. After watching me for several minutes, she began to focus on the light in the next room. Perhaps her departed grandmother made her presence known, or maybe it was just the light to which her eyes were drawn.

It is well that we are more drawn to light than darkness. The latter is something that is best faced and illuminated. While it can be fascinating, darkness is the dearth of light. Those things that are constructive and regenerative are what most merit our attention. As my granddaughter, with no understanding of language, as yet, develops her ways of communicating, eventually including language skills, I sense that her orientation will be towards proactivity and clarity. She already knows that while sometimes crying and fussing are necessary to get her needs met, there are also plenty of times when we attend to her calmer body language.

May she always turn to the light.

Thumb Rockets

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Posted by on in children, Community, Family, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 7, 2026- “Let me show you a trick that your granddaughter will think is the stupidest thing she ever saw”, the new friend from McKinney said over lunch at a local deli. He proceeded to have me wrap a piece of paper around my thumb, and twist it to make a little “hat” for the thumb. He’s right; I think Hana would roll her eyes at that part, when she is about eight or nine. He then had me make an OK sign with my other thumb and forefinger, put it around my wrapped thumb and pull the thumb out of the paper, but in such a way that it made the paper go up and out- a thumb rocket.

D is an interesting man who has not had an easy life. That puts him in good company with a number of people I’ve known over the years. The difference is, he’s made mostly good choices, from the time he was a child. Growing up in the north of this Metroplex, when it was a long ways from being a Metroplex, he’s seen it all happen. Still, as I watched, the farmer in him caught a small rat by the tail and disposed if it in a way that a man who has plowed through hard knocks for eight decades would do without batting an eyelash. (No, that was NOT in the deli).

Time with a good ole boy is spent in a way similar to how time is spent with a First Nations person, a nomad of the Negev, or a campesino anywhere in the Southwest or Mexico. The watch stays hidden, because schedules don’t matter. D told stories of his childhood and his large family. A lot of his experiences mirror those of my male elders. Farm life is a great connector. After the nearly ninety-minute lunch, I drove around the area a bit, to ponder all that I had heard.

I will see D., and other local Baha’is, on a regular basis, so perhaps I will earn other “tricks” that will make my granddaughter alternately giggle and groan.

Two Platesful

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Posted by on in animal and plant life, children, Community, Family, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 6,2026- Sportage is now a Texan. In this state, a vehicle is to have a license plate i front and one in back. The rear plate is easy to attach. The front will take a bit of professional installation, in a few days. In the meantime, there is, for good measure, a registration tag that sits inside the front windshield. Sportage will soon be two platesful. I will get my Texas driver’s license at the end of the month. Same with my voter ID.

I am again in the practice of eating three meals a day-each with one plateful. Our family is doing fairly well, and food is plentiful. I just don’t want my torso to become too plentiful.

Hana is now getting a bit more active, and wanting to stay awake more during the day. She wants to be with us during dinner, so one of us will start eating late and whoever finishes first will take over snuggling honours. She can see a shadowy figure of someone talking to her from the upstairs landing, as she is held by her grandmother on the downstairs couch.

There is a small garden plot, that Yunhee’s mother has cleared in the backyard. We can plant things like turnips and spinach, and I will need to build a fence that will keep the squirrels out, once the seeds are planted. We want to fill our bellies, not theirs. They have plenty of acorns.

That’s the news of the day from our cul-de-sac.

Communication

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Family, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 5,2026- Hana doesn’t like the smell of peppermint oil. When I had it on my breath, after lunch, she put her hand up to her nose. That is one of the messages the little lady sends to those who are paying attention. It’s not all squalling and fussing. Her eye contact is minimal, yet, but she does follow the sound of noise in the room and has started looking up at me when I speak to her. Smiles are mostly for her father, but I have received a few.Cooing shows a general state of contentment.

We have reached a level of communication in our house that I only wish government would follow. If the reasonable wishes of a two-week old infant can be noted and respected by adults in the house, then how is it that the reasonable thoughts and opinions of a citizenry are seen as little more than an impediment to the important affairs of a nation-or even a community (Austin, TX comes to mind, as does Surprise, AZ, in terms of executive hubris towards the public). There are many other examples, from top to bottom.

Hana will speak her mind, with increasing eloquence, as the years progress. She may be off base at times, and one of us will correct her, but she will never be told that she is out of order and needs to be silent. Communication goes two ways, which is something that so often gets forgotten, by those at the top of their respective heap.

A Little Bottle

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Posted by on in children, Community, Family, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 4, 2026- It was my turn to feed Hana her “lunch” bottle of pumped milk. The focus is in developing her posture and promoting good digestion, so I supported her in an upright position. At the halfway point, she let up and we walked around a bit, while I burped her and told her about all the good things that will be outside, when she gets old enough to go out in a stroller, and afterward. A few minutes later, we sat back down and she finished the bottle.

She has started to look around, especially trying to find her maternal grandmother, who has been the strongest presence in her life, besides her parents. Of course, at two weeks, she can see mostly large figures and bright colours. The voices, though, are what are the easiest to identify. Those little eyes, though, have started to search.

I will be an increasing presence in Hana’s life, especially after Halmoni goes back to Korea, at month’s end. There are other things to do in the interim, mostly getting my vehicle registered in Texas and changing my driver’s license to the Lone Star state as well. Planet Fitness is a mile from here, so I just have to convince them to accept the same e-mail that I used at the Prescott club. It seems silly to have to have a special e-mail, solely for a gym membership, but technology can be ludicrous at times. Other aspects-Red Cross, Farmers Market, American Legion and the Baha’i Center, will need to be visited this week. The bank, the VA and chiropractic will round things off.

The little girl, and her little bottle, will be the most important parts of my life, for months to come.

Time to Stay Put

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Family, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

January 3, 2026- It is a fine thing,sobremesa, the practice of sititng at the dinner table after a meal and having deep conversation. I’ve missed that, for the most part, over the past several years, only spending time in such a manner when with friends at restaurants. Now, this promises to be a nightly occurrence.

This evening’s talk touched briefly on the implications for the military, and its reserves, of today’s action in Venezuela, and possible other drastic moves in the weeks and months ahead. It also affects my intended visit to the Philippines. That is now postponed, indefinitely. My family’s sensibilities and the wider world’s instability have converged. There is, quite frankly, too much that is new: Hana, the house and her parents returning to work-albeit from home. I would be neither comfortable nor present being away from any of it.

There will again be a time when I will feel good about traveling, especially with family, domestically, and even going abroad, a few years hence. Now, though, my sense of adventure and equilibrium are focused on helping close to home and ensuring that a precious little girl gets off to a good start in life.

There is a lot one learns about oneself only when going through a novel situation.