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This week we mark the memorial of St. Gregory the Great, one of the saints from Redeeming Administration who has left the most lasting impression on me. Mostly because when he found out he’d been elected pope, legend has it that he hid himself in a wicker basket, had himself lowered over the walls of the city and escaped to the forest for three days before the people tracked him town and yanked him back. Some of us hear God’s voice to leadership and say, “Here I am, Lord.” Some of us take for the woods.

Not two hours after I posted my last newsletter—alas—I tested positive for Covid. Which meant no visit to family in Pasadena and San Diego. Which meant no catching up with one of my great mentors in life in Alahambra. Which meant no gathering in person with the teachers I’d been preparing to meet with. It was a genuine bummer.

When I was driving from Tampa, FL home to Atlanta at the end of last month, I passed the first billboard just south of the Georgia border on I-75 for “Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland” in Frankenmuth. I don’t know why this surprised me. Being from Missouri I know that the signage for Meramac Caverns starts long before one arrives in the Midwest. And who hasn’t seen the billboards for Wall Drug in South Dakota? Anyone? I think those start somewhere in Maine.

Good morning from the humid glory of Florida in July where I am enjoying working with a new group of Catechists of the Good Shepherd only a mile from the beach. Yes, it is very rough, but someone has to do it! We are on Day Three now and swimming in work more than waves, so I’ll be brief, but I wanted to share that last week I got wonderful news from the Catholic Media Association. Two pieces I wrote received awards at their 2022 awards ceremony.

I’ve enjoyed the gift of spending a good amount of time this past month at the Terra Sancta Retreat Center outside Rapid City, SD. If you ever get the chance to go there, you should. A wonderful, sacred setting in the Black Hills with marvelous hospitality and lots of space to roam. This time round there were no rattlesnake or mountain lion sightings as there have been in the past… but my friend Karen did get charged by a wild turkey.

Today marks the feast of St. Thomas More--one of the saints that I profile in Redeeming Administration—and, gosh, I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately.

How do you imagine the Holy Spirit? If you are anything like me, the picture that accompanies this posting is definitely NOT it. Dove. Fire. Wind. Breath. These I am all familiar with, but sister of “The Heat Miser” from my favorite Christmas cartoon?… That’s never been part of the litany.

If all goes well, by the time you read this, I will be home in bed after a long flight back from Munich to Atlanta. But that is not where I am right now. Right now I am on a train to Zurich and then onward to Germany in search of that tiny town of Oberammergau. Everything that has been said about Swiss trains is totally true. You can set your watch by them. They tell me that the German trains have lots of problems and sometimes are very late. I ask them what “late” means in Germany and they say.

If all goes well, by the time you read this, I will be in another country. No, I’m not fleeing the law or anything that exciting. Rather, my husband and I are attempting to finally do our 25th wedding anniversary trip. We’ve been trying for so long that we’ve now been married for 28 ½ years. But even as I have a hard time putting anything in print for fear of jinxing it, I do think that it will happen this time. We will be starting in Amsterdam and moving down the Rhine toward Oberammergau for the famed Passion Play.

After several weeks on the road, I was eager to get back to Atlanta and sleep in my own bed… but my husband had other plans. “I think you should go to St. Louis for Easter,” he said. “It’s been years now since you were able to be at the whole Triduum celebration at College Church. Years since you got to dye eggs and hunt them down on Easter morn. Years since you got ham and party potatoes and jelly beans.” All this was true. When there are just two adults in the household, you are not so likely to go on Easter egg hunts and buy candy for yourself. Now, mind you, sending me off to St.