Beca’s Blog

Have you ever stopped to think how often you’ve been protected and didn’t notice? Protection is something that happens so often we often don’t realize it. But, what about all the times we’ve tripped, almost pulled over into a car beside us, banged our head, walked into the street without looking, and were protected? Thinking [...]

Looking for writing ideas, I decided to go for a walk. Out into the world, where all ideas are waiting for me to catch a glimpse of them I didn’t have to go far. I stepped off the back deck just in time to see a tiny house wren hopping after a moth and catch [...]

This is the year of the chipmunks. Not sure why. Maybe there was a blackout one night, and all the chipmunks in our area spent the night making babies. For whatever reason, this year chipmunks had taken over our garden. Chipmunks are adorable. And destructive. Put the two together, and that means we trap them. [...]

I looked up and saw a miniature Native American chief in full dress walking on the edge of my deck. Okay. Not. But, for a minute my imagination took me there. And what I really saw was almost as astonishing as what I imagined. I have been reading the She Who Remembers book series by [...]

Mother’s day is a day we all celebrate because every one of us has had a mother. But, it could be more than a day of gifts and food. It is the perfect time to reevaluate how well we mother the people, places, and things in our lives. How well are we doing? Because not [...]

Sometimes I have no idea what to do with myself. Usually it is because there is so much to do. When it gets to be too much, I don’t want to do anything. Or I have so much on my mind, I don’t know what is the most important, so I don’t feel like thinking [...]

My sister wrote me and told me I was pronoid. Was she saying something nice? It had to be, it was my sister. So I looked it up in the urban dictionary. Yes, I am. Are you? It appears to be a condition I was born with. I can’t remember a time that I didn’t [...]

For a few winters, I forced Narcissus bulbs to bloom in our home. I wanted their beauty while the wind raged and the snow fell. We watched their growth from bulb to bloom with anticipation and joy. One year I put the bulbs in different glass containers on top of rocks, added water, and placed [...]

Football and I are casually acquainted, but it often inspires me. What I love most about it is the artistry and awareness that can develop between players. The most visible sign of this connection is between the quarterback and the receiver of his passes. There is nothing more glorious than watching a receiver make a [...]

I didn’t always have bird restaurants at my house. In fact, living in the city, spending twelve hours a day in my thirty sixth-floor office, I rarely saw them. Until one day, a bird ate my peanut and then something shifted, and I became a bird watcher. I had gone away for a week by [...]

We run three bird restaurants at our house. We placed them as close as possible to windows, so we always have a clear view of the endless stream of the many kinds of birds that come to dine. While I watch the birds through the window, I often carry on conversations with them, although probably [...]

To do great work a man must be very idle as well as very industrious. — Samuel Butler In front of me, the clouds swirled patterns of multiple shades of gray like a watercolor on canvas. Behind me, wisps of gray were taking over the white clouds in the blue sky. Around my feet the [...]

At our resent Shift Gathering Retreat, Del had the members of the group sit outside for about fifty minutes every day. Their task was to be still in nature, and to note what they saw, felt, smelled, and touched. In addition, they were to notice where they were sitting within the bigger landscape. Each person [...]

So sayeth the birds, animals, insects, and plants of nature. All nature not only knows this truth, but also lives it. We are different. We may know this truth, but we rarely live it. Instead, we pride ourselves on being able to do anything, and everything. When we are young, it’s good to know we [...]

They walked right through my screen door. I assured them I had done it myself, and I knew how to fix it. It’s a retractable screen door. This means that instead of stopping forward progress as a regular screen door would, it pops out of its tracks, and before you know it, you are on [...]

I love the idea of making the right thing easy, and the wrong thing hard. It’s simple, and at the same time has layers and layers of meanings. I first heard a horse trainer use it, but since we are always training our human minds, it is a perfect idea for us too. The obvious [...]

Have you ever stood in an empty football stadium? It is an awe-inspiring experience to stand in that huge open space. A space just waiting to be filled, a space with a complete understanding of its purpose, a space perfectly designed to fulfill that purpose. I had this experience during my high school reunion when [...]

One night I dreamed about a mouse. That’s all I remembered about the dream – a mouse telling me, “One thing at a time.” Del, with his years of nature and American Indian study, shared the meaning of mouse with me. It turns out that one thing at a time is exactly what a mouse [...]

I was walking a path in the woods. The trees came up to the edge of the path so I could only see a few yards in front of me as the path twisted and turned. As I walked, I noticed the strangest thing. If I thought of a chipmunk, it would run down the [...]

We know the story. A man named Jesus, while dying on a cross, said, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”* It astonished those who heard him speak. They expected him to speak words of condemnation, and he did not. That is amazing, especially when we think how difficult it can sometimes [...]

Our third floor window looked out onto a stand of trees. During the summer they provided a beautiful green curtain, and in the fall a glorious riot of color. Then one day, fall ended, and the leaves were gone, revealing a different view. Some of it was delightful. I could see the paths through the [...]

Outside my window, the trees were swaying, the clouds were racing across the sky, and the bird feeder was barely staying attached to its post. As I watched these events, it occurred to me that if I didn’t know about the force called wind, I might say that mystery and magic was at work. Why [...]

Have you seen the movie Love Actually? Its full title is Love Actually Is All Around Us and is a lighthearted, slightly irreverent movie, about seeing love everywhere. It points out that if we would just look, we would see that all there is — is love. Which prompts the questions, “What is love actually? [...]

Throughout the years, Star Trek has revealed many life lessons to me, and one of the most important ones is a reminder of how illusions work. It happened in the first Star Trek episode, The Menagerie, which aired in November of 1966. In an attempt to rescue Captain Pike from the Talosians, who were masters [...]