Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.
A small boy once approached his slightly older sister with a question about God. “Susie, can anybody ever really see God?” he asked.
Cricket had a gift for reaching others with her music. She could change her tune to suit her listener. She could perk you up with a bouncy melody, liven your step with a reel or jig or calm you with a hymn or ballad. That responsibility had begun to weigh cricket’s heart. Her tone became shrill.
I pulled into a gas station to clean off the window. As I was scraping, I heard a cell phone ring. A loud voice, from over by the next tank, called out, “Can you get it?! It’s probably one of the kids!” She was outside her car, pumping gas, but she did not want to miss that call that might have been from her kids.
Red roses were her favorites,
Her name was also Rose,
And every year her husband sent them,
tied with pretty bows.
The year he died,
the roses were delivered to her door.
The card said, “Be my Valentine,”
like all the years before.
