Last week we had a seminary fair for the students interested in ministry to check out some schools they might go to after they finish Jewell. I had a great time hanging out with some of the seminary representatives in the down time between student visits. I joined a few of them for lunch and we got to talking about all kinds of things. Usually I am more of a listener in conversations like this, but for some reason I had a lot to say that day! I ended up talking about my own seminary experience and our time at Druid Hills in Atlanta, and then about our garden and even my surgery last February.

Jackie from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Texas asked me if I was writing about any of this. My answer was "No, for now, but I do want to..."

I used to write a lot. Of course there were school papers for many years, then sermons for a while, and I have kept an extensive journal for a long time as well. I have also blogged before. Trinity and I have had a scrapbook/update kind of blog (The Honse Zoo) for a few years now, but I never saw that as a main creative outlet for my writing. For this kind of writing I had a journal/personal reflection blog for a few years during our time in Atlanta, which I called One's-Self I Sing, after a Walt Whitman poem. I retired that blog a while ago because I felt like it came from a certain chapter in my life that is closed now. But I have missed that kind of blogging ever since I ended One's-Self I Sing.

In fact I have hardly written anything at all for the past year or so, even in my private journal. I have gone through a lull; in more ways than one. I have not felt like myself. Trinity and I were in a constant state of transition and stress there for a while, and it took a serious toll on me. We moved across the country, switched jobs, bought a house, took in a few more animals (see the Zoo for more on this), I had pituitary surgery (that's basically brain surgery for those who don't know)!, my sister moved in with us and then out again, I switched jobs again...

I am sure I have forgotten something in there, but you get the point. I have stored up a lot in the last year-plus, and I am ready to share, to sort, to get back to the some good old reflection. I have been assigning a lot of "reflection papers" to my students at Jewell, but I am rusty at it myself. For them, it is still school-work. For me, it is life-giving, and my life has been lacking without my own "reflection papers." So, welcome to Volume 2. Thanks for listening (well, reading that is).