Up the Sunbeam

-- Drummer boy left early for church this morning. He had to be there by 8:30  to practice with the worship band in preparation for the service the rest of us would attend later . He walked to the car and I stood in my pajamas at the open door, watching him go. He noticed me lingering there, hesitated and said, "What are you doing?" "Just feeling the fresh air," I said, drinking in the beauty of just-sprinkled flowers sparkling in the early rays of golden light. He smiled a knowing smile (he knows his momma does odd things like that), told me he loved me and proceeded to get in the car. I kept standing there even after I'd watched him drive around the bend toward the pale remnants of a tangerine sunrise. I made a point to notice how cool the gentle breeze felt on my face, how crisp and clear the air smelled, and how deep the purple of agapanthus flowers appeared against countless shades of green. It was a new morning, one I'd never seen before, the ...

-- It is quite impossible to spend time in San Francisco without seeing the unusual . Donuts and Chinese Food? Why not? It is a city where oddity is normal, a place where spectacle is commonplace and a slightly magical land where stories on two feet walk freely among the skyscrapers and pass you on the street like a storybook parade of characters. This, like all cities, is a display of contrasts where breathtaking beauty and wretched, hellish ugliness live side by side, where extraordinary wealth and desperate poverty rub shoulders every day without surprise. Despite the fact that I have lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for over 30 years, and for most of that time have lived less than 25 miles (as the crow flies) from this world famous city, it always feels like an adventure to go there. The skyline and the city itself have hosted countless TV shows and movies and I have grown so familiar with it through those stories I always kind of feel like I'm meeting a superstar...