April 2004 

            Ever wish you could share a cup of tea with your favorite author?  I’ve imagined myself with Maud Montgomery, Louisa Mae Alcott and Madeleine L’Engel.  While on  a perfectly wonderful vacation to Cape Ann in Massachusetts, the mother of one of our exchange students and I toured the home of Louisa Mae Alcott. We sat on her chair, bounced on her bed, and imagined ourselves listening to her father’s lectures with her in the barn on their property.  We giggled like school girls as we snuck into her private world.

            I visited the home of Ernest Hemingway the following year  and held one of the descendants of his lucky seven-pawed cats. I’ve toured the home of Edgar Allen Poe intrigued by the genius of Tell-Tale Heart.  I took the ferry to Halifax and stood with Anne Shirley, admiring Prince Edward Island. Hawthorne’s House of Seven Gables was just as I pictured it, and 9997 Starvation Lane, Oregon, matches Jane Kirpatrick’s description in Homestead.  Mark fished with Jerry in the John Day River  and the catch was delicious.

            But, oh, to experience the England of Dickens, Orwell, Chesterton, and C.S. Lewis.  Someday I am going to visit Madeleine’s beloved farmhouse in Connecticut.

             I remember with deepest fondness my afternoon with the Author of all time.  I’d participated in an archeological dig at Bethsaida in Israel with my then high-school senior son.  At break time when the others were enjoying bagged lunches, I walked alone touching each stone, imaging Jesus in this place, when Mark Claire caught up to me and we meandered together, reminiscing our experience thus far in the Holy Land. 

            It surprised him that I referred to God as an author, and His book a romance.  I reminded him that God spoke creation into existence in Genesis, and  wooed us back  in John. We call it grace, God’s unmerited favor toward us, but he described it as love (John 3:16). He loved us before we knew enough to love him. In Spanish, John 1 translates “word” as verbo, or verb for he is the God of action.  He embraces us.

            Storytellers are in the business of moving you the readers from one place to another (the Greek meaning of metaphor).  We ask you to pack up your mental possessions and experience  life anew.

            It’s not yet spring in Pennsylvania, and my hills are a boring shade of mud, not much different than my backyard. I hate the scenery this time year, longing for the green that will carpet our valley in a few short weeks. I went to see Mel Gibson’s artistic rendition of The Passion, and cried with Mary as she held the broken body of her son.  Mary was still hoping against  hope. 

            I left the theater profoundly moved, but at peace--a peace Mary had not yet realized in that portrayal. I didn’t understand why, until Sunday morning when I accidentally kicked dead leaves from a cluster of budding crocus on the walkway by my home. 

            Easter comes as subtly as that fifteen-second Resurrection scene in the movie.  Jesus smiles.

            Rebirth takes us by surprise, like the first sprouts of spring.  And, like the author He is, God allows the actors to take the bows.

            And so it is with my characters, most are fictional, but many are folks like us, living and learning and kicking the leaves from the crocus. So bring your cup of tea or coffee to the computer when you come visit me, and on this page we’ll chat. 

            Let’s talk, challenge, and move one another to experience our Creator, the true Author,  in a new and exciting way.