Peaches

 Hello Everyone... and welcome to August's Spiritual Journey Group. August brings the best gifts to the garden and farmer's markets. 

Today I'm singing the praises of peaches.  It's another good harvest of NJ peaches, and I promise you they are among the best. So far we've only had a few, but each one was luscious. We've been eating them by the bowl, with cream and cinnamon.

What I love about peaches

I love their color

rich rich golds

deep deep blushes

their glow

I love their shape

the way they fit in my hand

their plumpness

their curves

orbs

I love their skin

tender

fuzzy

stained

I love their teasing slipperiness

can you get me into the bowl before I slip away?

firm enough to hold shape

juicy

I love their flavor

tangy

sweet

beguiling

irresistible

I love peaches

Truly august blessings

-- Karen E

Thanks to Linda Mitchell for hosting us today. You MUST read her thankful list today... summer has so many blessings!  Find her post HERE as well as links to others in the group.

Enjoy these last weeks of summer. 

A Lamp unto my Feet

 Hello friends...

Thanks to Kim for offering us this prompt, and for hosting this month.  You can find her post and links to others in this Spiritual Journey Thursday group at her site:  HERE.

I spent this week leading the craft section at the Vacation Bible School in my church.  We have 90 children from the ages of 4 through 6th grade.  What lovely children!!!  I want you to see some of the work they have done.  God is surely with us, and the path ahead looks bright when I look at the budding faith of these children.  Take a look...

We made rain forest animals. God's creation inspires us, fills us with awe, shows God's beauty.

We wrote cards for a girl we support in Malawi.  

We framed a favorite Bible verse:

It feels like God is leading us with these young ones.  "A little child shall lead them..."  It has been such a rewarding week. And exhausting. And crazy.  Not to mention chaotic. But...

We are richly blessed.  I hope these photos give you joy, hope, and renewed energy. I ask your prayers for all young ones, and for those of us working with them. May God's name be praised.

Pause and Reflect: Allegiance to the Lake

 It's been a while. And it is time to pause and reflect, to remember my moorings.

I'm taking a cue from Irene Latham and pledging allegiance to a lake. A lake vacation is planned for later in the summer, and I'm already champing at the bit. I can hear the water lapping... the loons calling. I can feel myself unwinding at the very thought. Ahhh...

I PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE

to the lake

to the soothing lap of water

to the wild and ancient call of the loons, to their elegant black and white evening wear, to ruby eyes, to sleek silhouettes riding low in the waves, to the intimate conversation of a mated pair, to fuzzy gray chicks riding piggyback, to raucous loon parties lasting far into the night, to deep dives

to eerie woodland stirrings, heard but never seen

to tiny orange salamanders, crawling in the duff

to kingfishers in white neckerchiefs and spiky caps as they skim the water, perch on a limb, project a presence twice their size

to waterlilies - white or yellow- and their shiny round pads

to tiny darting fishes, and big ones lurking in the shadowy deep

to lichens, gray-green, rust, black, ash, golden, splashed on rocks and trees with abandon

to the hootings of owls, to their lushly striped feathers and silent flight

to the evening gatherings of bats, gnat hunting in the twilight

to my hopes for a spacious screened porch with chairs, couch, blanket

to the canoe which waits and floats and conveys quietly

to many possibilities: beaver, otter, fox, martin, bear

to the myriad creatures hiding along the shores

to the burbling stream that feeds the lake

to the blush of sunset on glittering water

to the dip of paddles

to pencil and pad

to gratitude

to peace

  

--Karen Eastlund, 2026

And while I'm at it, I'll pledge allegiance to the USA and it's 250th. The semiquincentennial. 

I remember and celebrate our freedoms. May they long endure.

Ecclesiastes tells us there is a time for everything, and the next couple of months will be very busy. May I have enough energy!  And yes, I look forward to my time at the lake. It beckons.

Many thanks to Carol Varsalona for hosting this month. She suggested "Pause and Reflect" as our prompt. You can find her blog post and links to the rest of the group HERE.

 

Strengthen Us...

 Hello everyone. Welcome to Spiritual Journey Thursday. Leigh Anne Eck is hosting today, and suggested we blog about strength in our spiritual life. I thought it was a good topic.

I'm working my way through Lent by reading from my favorite prayer book: 

Celtic Daily Prayer: Prayers and Readings From the Northumbria Community

Each daily reading offers a short reading, three scriptures, and sometimes a poem. Last night's reading noted that many prayerful people find that the biggest battles are the ones inside us... the "fightings and fears, within, without." I find it so easy to fall into this kind of darkness. 

Here's part of the prayer:

Come swiftly, O Lord, to the dark moments when we are lost. Make us aware of Thy presence. Strengthen us to resist the urges and pulls to deeper darkness.

I love the prayer poems in this section, they repeat this first phrase:

I bind unto myself today

the power of God to hold and lead,

His eye to watch, His might to stay,

His ear to hearken to my need,

the wisdom of my God to teach,

His hand to guide, His shield to ward;

the word of God to give me speech,

His heavenly host to be my guard.

Easter is just a month away. May we find strength to keep the faith, to turn away from darkness toward God's light, and to remember that God is our strong leader, protector, advocate and guide. 

Thanks to Leigh Anne for hosting today. You can find her post and links to others in the group HERE.

One Little Word: 2026 plus an Attitude Adjustment

 

Welcome to Spiritual Journey Thursday. We are a group of poets and writers who gather once a month to write about our spiritual journeys. This month is hosted by Bob Hamera, who suggests we write about attitude. Since I missed last month, I'm combining his prompt with my One Little Word. I have chosen REMEMBER to guide me throughout 2026.

Thanks to Margaret Simon for this beauty!

I missed writing last month because my brother Erwin died two days prior. Although Erwin was 95, I was not expecting such news. I knew he had not been able to call me for several years but he was doing well in a nursing care. I knew his sense of humor was intact when I heard that one of the caregivers thought he was adorable. I imagined him rolling his eyes and smiling his most charming smile. I had a good laugh over that.

Erwin, known as Ervin at home, Sam at work

Of my six brothers, perhaps I spent less time with Ervin than most others. (We called him Ervin, though that wasn't his proper name. His wife called him Erv.) He was grown and out of the house by the time my memory kicked in. I saw him on special occasions. Still, I remember him laughing. He was always ready with a joke, a smile, a timely remark.

 Ervin loved cars and worked his way up to Superintendent of Fisher Body plants in Janesville and Detroit. At work he was "Sam." Co-workers said Sam was a fair boss, and I'm proud of that. Like Jay Leno, he knew everything you needed to know about cars. He was also generous and handy at fixing our various scrapes and dents.

A favorite family story took place at my parents' home in Omaha. It was the summer my father had a leg amputated and Ervin had come to help ease the shock. The mood at home was subdued, the neighborhood quiet. Daddy had been moved to the screen porch to get some fresh air.

 Neighbors across the street, a German grandmother, mother, and daughter Diane, had bought a car now that Diane was old enough to drive. Neither mom nor grandma drove. Diane and I were close in age, but she was a sheltered only child and I was Number Nine. When we were 6 or 7 and got clunky metal roller skates, she was only allowed one at a time. You may laugh, but I'm not kidding. Coordination wasn't her strength. And now she had a car. How would it go?

Learning to drive was challenge enough, but mom and grandma would give advice even though they had no experience. It seems we heard them say "Turn the back wheels!" That may be fantasy, but you get the idea. 

On this particular day all three women got in the car. Diane had to back the car out of her garage and turn it around in order to drive forward into the street. I imagine her maneuvering back and forth, this way and that, trying to get pointed in the right direction while mom and grandma urged one thing and another. No doubt Diane got flustered or put her foot on the wrong pedal, but in any event she suddenly plowed across the alley and into the neighbor's garage. CRASH!!!

All three sat in the car, motionless. Stunned. The storm windows that had been stored in the rafters of that garage fell on their car, and the walls of the garage buckled around them. 

My family ran to the windows, then stepped outdoors to see what had happened. Probably they all sucked in their breath when they saw the garage crumpled around Diane's car. But Ervin went over, undaunted. He had seen plenty of accidents on the factory floor. He would deal with it. He looked into the car, heard no moaning, saw no blood, so he opened the door as if a chauffeur, and asked most politely, "Would you ladies like to get out?" 

Daddy went outdoors for the first time since his operation. What he saw struck him funny. Nobody was hurt, and the comedy with Ervin was too much. He couldn't get the smile off his face if he wanted to. For him, the garage demolition became a total attitude adjustment!

I'm a little sad to say that I was at camp when all this happened, but the story lives in my mind's eye nevertheless. What a spectacle it must have been. I wish I could have seen their faces. For years you couldn't tell this story at our house without everyone doubling over with laughter. 

The story didn't end, of course. Before the summer was over Diane had plowed down a long section of her grandma's cyclone fence as well. I missed that too.

But most of all, Ervin, I will miss you. I already do. And I will remember!

Will the circle be unbroken
By and by Lord, by and by
There's a better home awaiting
In the sky Lord, in the sky.

Thanks for reading, and thanks to Bob for hosting today. You can find his post HERE. Look for links to others in the group on Bob's page.

a song of mending

Hello Friends:

This is a last minute post, so please... please show some compassion!  

Welcome to this group of writers ... Spiritual Journey Thursday is our name.  Today is hosted by Kim Johnson, who provided the prompt of "compassion."

I'm thinking about relationships and how they change over time. A thoughtless word or irritation can make the whole house of cards come down, or feel that it is coming down. But a spirit of compassion by one member can stitch it back together again. And how precious that compassion is. How it is more precious than gold.

This past year I started a sewing project, but then lost impetus. Stitching is trickier these days. My hand is unsteady. My patience grows thin. But a conversation with an old friend has changed my outlook. Her words and laughter were healing balms to me. I feel renewed, patched together. In many ways she has shown me great compassion, and her friendship is a deep blessing. One thing we touched on is our sewing. We're both still sewing, still have fabric waiting for us.

Today I came upon this poem by Irene Latham, and stitches begin to fall into place. Perhaps, for today, my words will be stitches. Perhaps I can be the one whose words show compassion. Perhaps I can hum and stitch as I go.

Mending

And this is how

we shall remake

the world:

like a seamstress

with pins in her mouth,

steady fingers

coaxing thread,

a hum forever

in her throat

as stitch by stitch

the fabric is fitted, gathered -

until what was once tattered

now dances across the floor.

- Irene Latham

When I can't stitch or find the right words, I can pray. I can find no greater compassion just now. I can fit a prayer into a breath or two. I can remember a name, a face, a situation, and breathe a prayer as I go about the day. In the car or in the shower.  Prayer and compassion seem synonymous.

Today I am thankful for compassionate friends, kind words and laughter. I am thankful for this online community of writers. I am thankful for the challenge ahead. 

Thanks to Irene, whom I haven't thanked ahead of time, for her beautiful poem. And thanks again to Kim, who has need of our compassion after the loss of her father, for hosting. You can find her post HERE.

Many blessings to all.

Summer Pleasures

Hey...Happy July!  Summer is a great time to celebrate Poetry Friday. My summer duties are accomplished and I'm relaxing into a summer lull. Behold two summer pleasures:

In March of 2020 I wrote about elderberries, but since then we planted some bushes in our yard. This is their third year and the bushes are heavy with berries. We are very excited because it looks like we will have enough for elderberry jelly. Take a look:

Burgeoning elderberries

Here's my poem about elderberry jelly. (Reminder, elderberries must be cooked.)

Elderberry Jelly

Pick some plumpish elderberries

Deeply purple, almost black

Cook them in a jelly pot

Make a jellied berry snack

Squeeze the berry juice out slowly

Bubble liquid 'til it's thick

Pour the jellied juice in jars

Pop the top on quick

Taste the deep rich berry flavor

I think no jelly could excel it

Wear your berry purple smile

Who cares if grape outsells it?

© Karen Eastlund

Our hands will be purple when we make jelly... a good rich purple that speaks of earth and health and joy. Isn't that what summer's all about? When deep in berries, laugh and enjoy.  

And then I ran across this little poem that I had written and tucked away, long forgotten. We don't have hammock facilities now, and my grandkids are mostly grown, but I love the memory. Here's hoping it brings a smile to you also:

In My Hammock

Hammock like a giant sling
In its cradle siblings swing
Whispers, laughs or loud harangue
In summer's lull it's cool to hang.

- Karen Eastlund, 2017

My hilarious grandkids

Poetry Friday is hosted by Jan Godown Annino today. Find her post and the links to others in the Poetry Friday community HERE.  Jan imagines floating like a manatee for maximum relaxation and renewal.

Thanks for stopping in. I hope you find time and space to dig into nature, swing in a hammock, and just breathe and float. 

Still Waters

 

Welcome to the July 2025 edition of Spiritual Journey Thursday. We are a small group of poets writing each month about the inner life. This month I'm hosting, and I offered the prompt of Still Waters. 

My husband and I bought a canoe and took a number of trips into the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) in Minnesota when we were first married. We loved it. The BWCA is a protected area, open to those in canoes and kayaks. Except for a few entry lakes, motors are forbidden. 

Paddling is a quiet enterprise, just the dipping of paddles and swish of water. You hear all the chirping and thrumming of nature. We learned to keep our eyes and ears open and were often rewarded. Early one morning a moose passed within feet of our tent just after clompping out of the lake. Even though our Duluth pack of food was hoisted high over a limb, the moose had to lower its huge rack to get under it. Moose are ENORMOUS! We've seen beaver pulling young branches across a lake, no doubt busy at home improvement, and we were thrilled to see otters glide sleekly through the water. 

We watched kingfishers flit from tree to tree, and saw them dive and come up with breakfast in their beaks. We startled great blue herons, their huge wings flapping to a roost in the trees. We heard the pileated woodpecker knocking on an old pine and noticed its resemblance to the ancient pterodactyl.

While exploring a quiet bay we suddenly came upon a loon on a nest, its head hung down near the water. Loons will play dead as a defensive behavior if they feel threatened, and we had come upon it unaware, just a few feet away. We didn't want to scare it from the nest so we went quietly by. I still wonder if those eggs hatched successfully. In the BWCA you can hear loons day and night. Some evenings their parties are loud and raucous with calls echoing from lake to lake. There's nothing like the ancient and eerie calls of loons. They signal that all is well in the north woods.

We had all these wonderful adventures in and around water. What a blessing we have in water. The cooling splash on a warm day. The gentle bobbing. The sunset reflected on the shiny surface. I can think of nothing more beautiful and life-giving than water.

We loved the waters of Minnesota, though they were not always still. We had waves that bounced us and a few white caps to teach us respect. We had roiling gray waters, and water dimpled with rain. We scraped our canoe on any number of rocks. Mainly, though, we were lucky. Blessed. We were amateurs, learning along the way. By the grace of God, we never flipped into the water.  

I am deeply thankful for our adventures in still waters. We two in the canoe are some of my most treasured memories.

This summer we decided to put our old aluminum canoe up for sale. It's in great shape and will last another 50 years. I'm a little sad, but we have other adventures ahead of us. Whoever gets our canoe will make their own adventures, and I will wish them still waters and happy paddling.

"He leads me beside still waters."  

Yes!

Thank you for visiting and reading today. Join us with a comment or a post. Just leave a link in the comments below.

Summering

 Hello and welcome!!!

By the calendar it is not yet summer, but by my thermometer it is almost 90 degrees fahrenheit! It feels like summer. I was out pulling weeds today, sharing breathing room with a bumble bee and a honey bee, both humming around my shrubs. My flowers are blooming.

I'm throwing caution to the wind and trying a tomato plant again this year. The last few times I've tried have been disasters. So... this time I'm reading about tomato needs. I don't remember ever having these problems in my younger years. Have tomatoes changed?  Have I? Or is it the half barrel I'm trying to grow them in? Wish me luck.

Summer is not my favorite season, I'm a cool weather person, but summer does have its pleasures. I love the fresh snap peas from my garden, the brilliant red geraniums, walks in the cool evening air. I love to watch embers glow in our fire pit and to hear the geese just overhead as they wing down to the river.

Summer can offer more time to read, and I have read some favorites lately. I highly recommend:

Great Short Works of Willa Cather edited by Robt. K. Miller

Favorites:  

Eric Hermannson's Soul

A Wagner Matinee

The Bohemian Girl

Neighbor Rosicky

                        

For my book group I chose:

Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

early responses:  enchanting... a treasure

Because we're approaching the 250th anniversary of our country:

1776 by David McCullough

fascinating history

Most anything by Gary Paulsen:

Brian's Winter

Dogsong

I wish you a good summer, good reading, good rest for your soul.

Thanks to Ramona Behnke for hosting this month and for providing this prompt. Please find her post and links to others HERE. 

For everything there is a season... Ecclesiastes 3:1.

Spring: A Time of Beauty & Renewal

Many thanks to Carol Varsalona for hosting today, and for offering the prompt of "Blossoming on the Spiritual Journey." Let's all keep Carol in our hearts as she has had a significant loss.  She shared this poignant quote: "A world of grief and pain, flowers bloom—even then." --Kobayashi Issa

Following her prompt of blossoming, here are some spring photos from New Jersey:

I posted the following poem when I first started my blog, back in 2019, and today I decided to share it again.  This is by John Neihardt, a Nebraska poet. I heard him recite this poem when he visited the college I attended way back in the day. The poem is so effusive, and when I see spring in New Jersey I see that same effusiveness in nature. It is titled "April Theology" but -- I hope you will agree that it works for May.

April Theology

O to be breathing and hearing and feeling and seeing!

O the ineffably glorious privilege of being!

All of the World’s lovely girlhood, unfleshed and made spirit,

Broods out in the sunlight this morning — I see it, I hear it!

So read me no text, O my Brothers, and preach me no creeds;

I am busy beholding the glory of God in His deeds!

See! Everywhere buds coming out, blossoms flaming, bees humming!

Glad athletic growers up-reaching, things striving, becoming!

O, I know in my heart, in the sun-quickened, blossoming soul of me.

This something called self is a part, but the world is the whole of me!

I am one with these growers, these singers, these earnest becomers —

Co-heirs of the summer to be and past aeons of summers!

I kneel not nor grovel; no prayer with my lips shall I fashion.

Close-knit in the fabric of things, fused with one common passion —

To go on and become something greater — we growers are one;

None more in the world than a bird and none less than the sun;

But all woven into the glad indivisible Scheme,

God fashioning out in the Finite a part of His dream!

Out here where the world-love is flowing, unfettered, unpriced,

I feel all the depth of the man-soul and girl-heart of Christ!

‘Mid this riot of pink and white flame in this miracle weather,

Soul to soul, merged in one, God and I dream the vast dream together.

We are one in the doing of things that are done and to be;

I am part of my God as a raindrop is part of the sea!

What!  House me my God?  Take me in where no blossoms are blowing?

Roof me in from the blue, wall me in from the green, and wonder of growing?

Parcel out what is already mine, like a vender of staples?

See! Yonder my God burns revealed in the sap-drunken maples!

- John Neihardt

Praise God for the mystery and beauty of spring, for the glorious blooms,

for the exuberance of life, and for the promise that we, too, can be renewed.

He makes everything beautiful in its time.  Ecclesiastes 3:11

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Psalm 51:10

Sending my best wishes for a beautiful month.

The Migration of Cranes... and a Poem of Gratitude

 Hello All and welcome to Spiritual Journey Thursday, this month hosted by Ruth Hersey from Kampala, Uganda. Thank you, Ruth! Because we are in the Christian season of Lent, Ruth prompted us to write a psalm of lament. I love this prompt, but decided to save it for another time because I have an amazing experience to share. 

I just returned Nebraska where my niece Becky invited me to see the migration of the sandhill cranes. This natural phenomenon was on my bucket list, and it did not disappoint. The count of cranes is the highest ever: 736,000! 

The migration of cranes is one of the most spectacular natural phenomena, comparable to the migrations of wildebeest and caribou. Every year, 400,000 to 600,000 sandhill cranes—80 percent of all the cranes on the planet—congregate along an 80-mile stretch of the central Platte River in Nebraska to fatten up on waste grain in the empty cornfields before continuing their journey to their Arctic and subarctic nesting grounds.

The sandhill cranes' migration is also one of the oldest known bird migrations, with fossil records indicating that it has been occurring for millions of years.

text & photos from internet

Every spring, cranes migrate from Texas, southern California and Florida, coming together for a stopover in Nebraska, and then fan out again to their northern breeding grounds. Within a span of 50 miles or so, cranes gather along the Platte to rest, eat, and dance their dances before heading north to reach their breeding grounds. 

What we saw: Cold wind and rain greeted us. We spent our first full day birding from the car. Cranes were everywhere in the fields, even along I-80, gleaning corn and wheat, insects and any small animal that came in their path . Sometimes we saw a few in a group, sometimes the entire field seemed alive with cranes. A few were close enough to see the red on their heads, and to see them jumping and flapping. 

The next day was dry and we went to the Platte River at sunset to watch the cranes return for the night. The water provides them sanctuary since an approaching predator's splash would raise an alarm. From a bridge over the river, in a cold wind, we heard and saw long skeins of cranes gathering, circling and calling to each other.  In gathering darkness we could hear them before we saw them. Skein after skein seemed to materialize out of nowhere. Huge numbers flew right over us amid a cacophony of ancient voices! Various voices, both low pitch and high, clacked, thrummed, and filled the air with a sense of burgeoning life.  There is something eerie and primeval in their calls, especially when you hear a large group. We almost expected to see dinosaur footprints in the sandbars of the Platte. 

You can learn about sandhill cranes HERE.

I'm especially grateful to Becky for planning and hosting this trip. The sights and sounds will stay with me for a long time. Just to be on that ancient flyway was remarkable. I have been on the Platte in the past, but I have an entirely new appreciation for it now.

Also deep appreciation to my niece Ruth who drove 9 hours in stiff wind to join us. 

Ruth, me, Becky

We hoped the cranes would land in front of us and that we might get photos of them in the sunset. Instead, they roosted further along the river. Still, we experienced the flyover of hundreds, if not thousands, of cranes. I can't find words to fully express it.

David Budbill wrote a poem after seeing a sunset. He ends his poem with the same sense that I felt after seeing the cranes. So... without further ado:

photo from my trip to Alaska

Winter: Tonight: Sunset

David Budbill

... I stop

and look at the sky. Suddenly: orange, red, pink, blue,
green, purple, yellow, gray, all at once and everywhere.

I pause in this moment at the beginning of my old age
and I say a prayer of gratitude for getting to this evening

a prayer of being here, today, now, alive
in this life, in this evening, under this sky.

***

Sometimes we see something so astounding or beautiful, so wrenching or tender, that our hearts are too full to be able to articulate. For me, poetry fills the gap.

Thanks again to Ruth Hersey. Please take time to read her beautiful lament HERE, and to follow the links to other posts in this Spiritual Journey group.