Losing Eden: Thoughts and Essays on the Way Out

This series of essays are primarily based on newspaper articles I have written as part of a column entitled "Losing Eden." Those articles have to do with God's intention since Day 7 to become an Empty Nester and get us to use, as my mother used to say, "The good brain God gave you (me)." Free will was the plan all along because love can't be love unless it is freely given. Human beings, God knew in God's heart of hearts, are most fully alive when there is the give and take of love. So, God sets us up in the Garden. "See that Red Delicious. Do Not Touch, it is shiny, tasty, symmetrical but verboten," and his accomplice the snake says, "and it has the benefit of making you wise." So, what we do we do? Sacrifice three square meals a day, naming rights that God has given us for the animals in the shelter for dislocation, hard work and harder labor in childbirth. As we leave, we leave only with only a map labeled 'free will" which cause us to often feel more lost than ever. These essays chronicle the road out and the places it takes us. Some roads are full of joy, and sorrow, some lead to more life, some to grief, all eventually to death. Or do they? And while the GPS gets no signal where we are, we are still able to witness vistas we never knew existed and are given a taste that there is Something more. We stop at places that our internal and infernal sense of direction have led us. These brief stops are around things that touch us deeply like, death, grief, compassion, life's milestones, ethics, aging, learning how to be fully awake, all intimations of our truest home, so that someday, we might find our way back. We travel down paths where the most vulnerable congregate and learn how we might be able to practice kindness here and there. Included also are directions to build a storm shelter wherever we are, one that welcomes us all- wherever we are on life's journey.