the life I lead is the life I read... the life I led was the life I read...
My Great Grandparents, H.S. Calahan & Lala Shelby Calahan, 5th&6th from the right, at their baptism, probably in Louisiana, circa 1900. I grew up in the Texas Panhandle the small farming community of South Plains that centered around a school with eight grades and a Baptist Church where my great-grandmother was a charter member and half the deacons were my great uncles. The church had two revival…
Some folks have suggested that I start publishing my blog again. I've had to recover my account to do so. So this is a test run. I've also been considering whether I should restart the blog or whether I should start using Substack. I think I've decided that the past posts of The Life I Read are valuable enough to accept the "less professional" look of .blogger rather than my own dedicated domain.…
In the darkest season of the year, we wait for the light. We light candles to represent the coming Light. This blog post reprises my facebook books prepared for my church during 2020: A collection of verses from the Psalms which help define five Hebrew words: Hope. Peace. Joy. Love. Messiah. The last section includes my own translation of the 89th Psalm. Tomorrow marks the first Sunday of Advent…
[Teaching notes by K Cummings Pipes, SouthwestCentralHouston, ZOOM class This is the second in a series. Here is a link to Part 1: Hebrew Poetics in Psalm 1 ] Andrea read Psalm 1. Blessed! How blessed! Not a statement of fact. Not a teaching or code of law. It's a procl amation, a shout, an assertion of deep fulfillment, a state of harmony with the world, with others, and with oneself. It's a bold…
The message of the First Psalm overlaid on a painting by Floyd County Artisit Winnie Carthel which hangs on the wall of my bedroom. [Teaching notes by K Cummings Pipes, SouthwestCentralHouston, ZOOM class This is the first of a series of 2. I link the November 19 post with Part 2 Hebrew Poetics: Concantentaionhttp://the-life-i-read.blogspot.com/2020/11/hebrew-poetics-concantenation-through.html ]…
I recently accepted a Facebook challenge: " One book a day, for seven days, which has had an effect on you. No details, just the cover." Such a challenge can nearly kill me because I always have something more I want to say, but mostly I played by the rules. I chose 7 books from my library shelves, arranged them on my library table in the order in which I had read them, took a photo of each, and…
The serious study of Hebrew Prophets is a dangerous business but the church where I worship is willing to grapple with serious things and to hear judgment and instruction. We have spent the last several weeks with the Prophet Jeremiah whose words all too often seem all too pertinent for our time. Today I was asked to lead our congregation in a prayer of lament. A biblical lament [there are many…
I usually serve this cake with my homemade lemon curd and I use the same mixing bowl and beaters for the cake. Since I don't wash them in between the cake has just a touch of lemon. This cake is extra moist and tender. I have, at times, added golden raisin, chopped dates, pecans, and a little candied ginger and called it fruitcake. Good fruit cake. As my sister-in-law once said, "This is…
YWWH Ra'ah LORD, My Shepherd Sometime last August, Andrea Castle Engle handed me her outline for the Thursday Bible Class at SouthwestCentralHouston and asked me to reflect on How to Secure Peace in an Anxious World. She had chosen a key verse: "I will both lay me down in peace and sleep: for Thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety.” Psalm 4:8 Andrea focused on the 4 th Chapter of Philippians…
David Meggs Pipes 27 November 1948 - 3 January 2018 David Meggs Pipes was the eldest child of Charles David Pipes and Betty Meggs Pipes. He was born November 27, 1948, in Fort Worth, Texas. The family would grow to include two sisters Mary Nel, Melinda Beth, and a brother, Bryan Charles. Charles Pipes was recalled to active duty for the Korean War and the family moved frequently with U.S. Air…
On Sunday 11 July 2017 at Southwest Central Houston, I preached my first sermon. I am 68 years old; I never thought such a thing would be possible in the fellowship where my husband and I have chosen to worship and serve since our university days. I am publishing my sermon as written and I was pretty close to the script. There were a couple of stutters and missteps early on but I did get into the…
Today I'm making soup. I like to make soup because it's basically just putting a bunch of good stuff into a pot (or a slow cooker) and going away to do whatever one wishes or needs to do. The bits and pieces will cook, the flavors will meld; soup is like a good community it makes a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. As the pot bubbles happily, the soup will fill the kitchen, the…
Making a few notes re. my birthday visit a week or so ago to the Museum of Fine Arts Houston with my dear friend since college days. We've been walking through that museum together for almost 50 years. Such a friendship is the best gift! MFAH Emperors Treasures: Chinese Art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei Cathey noted the dynasty changes and interactions with other world cultures. This was…
My love of costume jewelry is well known to my friends. I am blessed to have several pieces that belonged to my grandmothers and at least one that belonged to a great grandmother. When I shop an antique store, a pawn shop, or an estate sale, I always browse the jewelry for something interesting or pretty. My collecting rule is simply that I must be able to afford it and I must like it. If I see…
N INETEENTH -C ENTURY G ENDER S TUDIES I SSUE 8.1 (SPRING 2012) Charlotte Yonge’s “Goosedom” By Georgina O’Brien Hill , University of Chester http://www.ncgsjournal.com/issue81/hill.htm C http://community.dur.ac.uk/c.e.schultze/context/goslings.html harlotte Yonge: The Goslings Charlotte Yonge's essay society for teenage girls and young women THE GOSLING SOCIETY 1859-1877 Unidentified Goslings…
This painting by Helen Allingham (1848-1926) "Old Worn Woman" reminds me of an illustration in one of Evelyn Whitaker's books or maybe its cover. I need to follow-up. No time just now. A link to the blog where I found it from the BWWA facebook group. https://reveriesunderthesignofausten.wordpress.com/2015/08/19/helen-allingham-1848-1926/
from Mrs. Beeton's Everyday Cookery I am not feeling well today and what I really, really want is a huge bowl of Yia Yia's Chicken Soup from my favorite Greek restaurant which closed several years ago when the owners went home to Greece to care for an aging mother. I miss them, I miss the restaurant, I miss the herbed lamb souvlaki, but most of all I miss Yia Yia's chicken soup. The healing powers…
A few days ago, "my memory turning to lace" could not produce the name of a woman I met at the British Women Writers Conference 2010 and with whom I had had a lovely conversation re. Christian Rossetti. I know that all my conference notes are carefully put away somewhere. Where? Not found. In turning a closet and one room into a disaster area, what I found was an archival box labeled: "K To Do"…
Walter Benjamin. Clippings from a Google image search screen shot. I have always been an opportunistic reader, reading whatever happened to be at hand. I am also a disciplined reader; give me a list of required reading and I read through it. (Always excepting Ulysses by James Joyce--I tried and tried and tried again. Three strikes and out.) First and foremost, I am a meandering reader. When I read…
illumination of Psalm 27 by James S. Freemantle The Psalms of David, William Morrow, 1982 I taught in October 2013 but failed to post my Hebrew word study of בֵּית ba yith which means House, Household, Home, Family, Temple, Palace, Shelter, Stronghold, Door, and, surprisingly, Daughter Strong’s # 1004 http://biblesuite.com/hebrew/1004.htm It is a masculine noun and derives from a primitive root,…
1925 photo of Sunset School, housed in a wooden building. I attended a rural school in Floyd County, Texas, and several years ago created a facebook group for the South Plains School Alumni & Community . Today one of the discussions took a bit of a turn from remembering and honoring a community member who had died to a discussion of the school's history. As it happened, a bit later in the day I…
"Don't judge a book by its cover" is an idiomatic phrase which cautions against opinions based on outward appearances. . The Paris Winter by Imogen Robertson is a book in which the plot hinges on the judgments the characters make based on appearances. From the first page to the last, in the world of this book nothing and no one are quite what they seem to be. The book surprises and its plot twists…
Margaret Gey and Minnie in the Geys laboratory. "Margaret's surgical training was the only reason the Gey lab was able to grow cells at all." SEASONS met in January to finish our discussion of Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. "...this book isn't just about science; it's about gender, race, and life itself." "We must not see any person as an abstraction." "Black scientists and…
World Toys and Gifts where I listened to their story... “Deep down I know I could never be that innocent again, however much I'd like to be.” This quote and others in this blog are from Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl . When I first read this book I was a freshman in high school and the same age as Anne was when she was writing. I finished it with sobs and immediately read it again. I gave…
Title page of Gaskell's Cranford from my library designed by Reginald Knowles in the style of William Morris. Elizabeth Gaskell (1820 - 1865)became one of my favorite writers a decade or so ago after I read this charming little edition of Cranford A Tale . I had bought it as a decorative item for its gold embossed "maroon leatherette cover" with gilded pages and the phrase hidden in the gold on…