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Standing in the Spirit
Dear Friend, In my last reflection, I mentioned that I was confused by (or had forgotten about) the timeline that Marley gives to Scrooge, for the visits from each ghost. In Stave One, Marley tells Scrooge they’ll appear to him over the course of three nights. My memory of the story is that the ghosts…
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Something Wonderful Will Come
Dear Friend, Although we’ve only read Stave One of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, I’m already grateful we chose this one as a contemplative read. I thought I knew this story intimately, having read it many times and seen its adaptations countless more, but already in these first pages, I’m connecting to it more than…
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December’s Carol Begins
Dear Friend, Today, I put up my Christmas tree and began reading this month’s contemplative reading selection, Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. A Christmas Carol The editors at Chiltern, who publish my chosen copy of the book, write: “In 1843, Charles Dickens took up his pen to begin his ‘ghostly little book’ and so created…
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Today the Floes Came
Dear Friend, What a joy it’s been to visit with Mary Oliver. She, like Ocean Vuong, Kurt Vonnegut, Virginia Woolf, and select others, always makes me feel like I’ve come home again. I think this final part of Long Life might have been my favorite, since it was the most personal and intimate. While each…
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The Morning Settles Upward
Part Two of Oliver’s Long Life is titled, “Wordsworth’s Mountain,” which also happens to be the title of the first chapter in this part of the book. She begins again with the act of observing the world, something I’m beginning to suspect will always be her entry point, and perhaps her primary gift or teaching…
Contemplative Reading Project 