It’s awfully quiet in my little corner of the world this morning. Not even one breeze stirs the maple out front. Rain fell during the night and dark clouds promise there may be more rain. Nemo snoozes, the refrigerator clicks on, and even the birds are still. A light shines from my neighbor’s window […]

What Is That Sound?
(Minnesota lake photo by Missy Day Albrecht) On the north side of my house is a happy tangle of ferns, hostas, violets and lily-of-the-valley. I call this my woods garden. For one thing, it grows without much help from me. For another, this pretty group of flowers remind me of taking a walk through […]

Dream Your Troubles Away
We all have a dream–something that puts a spring in our steps and a gleam in our eyes. Dreams are those wonderful things as filmy as a spider’s web, as substantial as moonbeams, somewhere ahead of us, calling to us to follow, to pursue, to hope, to reach. We can spin dreams of the […]

Summer in Your Soul
“For him in vain the envious seasons roll Who bears eternal summer in his soul.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes, The Old Player Is summer in your soul? I mean the best parts of summer–barefoot days, bees busy in the clover, blue skies studded with white puffs of clouds. I’d like to keep those days of warmth […]

Water Waves and Freckle Creams
Come with me for a trip into history and delve into a 1921 issue of The Etude, Presser’s Musical Magazine. I’m not sure where I bought this magazine but it’s fascinating because it’s from a much different era of America. Woodrow Wilson was President that year; that is, until March 4 when Warren G. Harding […]

Cut It Out!
“Cut it out!” I used to hear this phrase a lot; not so much nowadays. It just means, “Stop that.” Stop doing or saying whatever. It’s a useful phrase, a word picture of taking a pair of scissors and snipping off something, or using a black marker and rubbing it out. The thing of it […]

