I once performed Mozart’s “Laudaute Dominum” in Salzburg Cathedral with about a dozen high school classmates. Mozart wrote that piece of music for the cathedral’s archbishop in the 1780s. It was to be part of evening vesper services. For us, it was a normal day in one...

My view this morning from a park bench in Seoul’s Sajik Park. As early walkers looped past me every so often, I considered my last morning on foreign soil. Tomorrow, we wake up in Hawaii. Today, on a bench — I read in the Old Testament about something the Israelites did after...

Big mystery from today in Takayama, Japan: At 1:30 in the afternoon, we heard music played on — it seemed — a loudspeaker mounted on every other lamp post in the city’s wide valley. Then … a voice began saying something. Echoes from that voice bounced from loudspeaker...

Years ago before a seventh grade math class, a newly sharpened pencil started rolling down my pitched desk. I moved quickly to catch it before it landed in my lap. I missed … the pencil landed eraser end down … and the lead tip dug deeply in to my left palm. A mark has been inside...

According to legend, the floors of Nijo Castle in Kyoto, Japan were crafted to squeak like the song of a nightengale — to warn the Shogun and his bodyguards of prowling ninja. Here’s a brief clip of the that sound (presented here on the website). H, W and I visited Nijo Castle...

This morning was lazy, unplanned — and glorious. I went for a long stroll along Kyoto’s central river walk. It was unhindered time. Whole groups of falcons soared in circles above. I passed families eating picnic lunches. A cormorant came in for a landing next to me in the river,...

While riding one of Japan’s bullet trains between Kyoto and Tokyo earlier this week … S and I employed a tried and true parenting/teaching tactic to get some substantive schoolwork done: If you write four haiku poems about ANY experience so far in Japan, you can play on the...

When our Kyoto landlord asked W, H, and E this week about some of our trip traditions, they told him about what they have come to call “forced marches” — required journeys and hikes and walks through beauty or history or both. Their description of the phrase got a big laugh...

Since last July, our three boys have lost a total of 13 teeth. E lost our latest Wild tooth yesterday — after visiting Tokyo’s Sensoji Temple. We celebrated with ice...

A memory of my maternal grandmother, who used expressive words and expressive gestures to carry everyday conversations so well: Mama Liz often worked in references to music in her stories. She would say something like “Dah dah dah dah dah” in a particular rhythm, and her hands and...

When we started this journey, our itinerary was a list of PLACES we would visit. Looking back on our journey so far, it is PEOPLE who are the milestones. We REMEMBER the steps of our journey through the litany of people we met — and loved. These are a few dozen steps of the many...

When you think of Kyoto, Japan — you think of a “hamburg(er)” restaurant decorated like an Alabama southern cookin’ joint playing “You make me wanna roll my windows down” to a host of empty booth tables, right? Pass the fried chicken. Seriously. At...

This slideshow requires JavaScript. When S called out from inside our Xian bathroom for a volunteer to cut her hair, E was the first to scramble off the sofa and take the scissors from her hands. She’d been inspired by a friend who described how you can grab a fist of hair just so...

As rush hour clogged the Bell Tower area of Xian’s old city this evening, a handful of women stood shoulder to shoulder in the middle of a busy sidewalk. They shouted from their military-like formation at young, smartly dressed women who passed by. The scene was puzzling. Had the...

Monday afternoon in Xian, China: Two blocks of vendors hang calligraphy brushes and stack thick parchment rolls in stalls under canvas umbrellas. A dozen women in comfortable clothing move through the delicate choreography of a sword dance, as their teacher — an elderly man —...

We’re sleeping tonight in the eastern-most city of the ancient Silk Road. Opting for four berths in a sleeper train over camels or horses, we completed the 12-hour journey earlier this morning in Xian, China … home of the formerly buried terra cotta warriors. The center of...

I first entered a conflict zone as a journalist in Iraq in 2003. The international invasion had just ended. As my colleagues and I tried to make sense of things, the Jordanian Embassy was attacked … and the United Nations Baghdad headquarters was decimated by a truck bomb. It turned out...

The preschoolers at New Day Foster Home decorated felt hearts this week with thick princess stickers and crosses. They were crafting Mother’s Day gifts for the women who care for them in the in-between times — at night, during breakfast and dinner, over weekends, and every other...

I seem to have lost clarity on an important parenting principle over the last few years. It came back to me this morning as I helped a preschooler work on a 25-piece puzzle. The principle is this: it’s not about the puzzle. My puzzle partner wasn’t likely going to finish the...

On May 1, 1947, the Brooklyn Dodgers played against the Chicago Cubs at home on Ebbets Field. The Dodgers scored three runs in the second inning … and the Cubs were never able to catch up. It was early in the baseball season — a ground-breaking season — as Jackie Robinson...