Last month I received a phone call from a friend in Nashville who I worked with when I lived there in 1991. His name is Sizwe Herring.

Sizwe -- which means "land and nation" in Zulu --  is the visionary director of the George W. Carver Food Park. For two decades, the park has served as a community demonstration site for composting and gardening in Nashville’s inner-city neighborhoods. The park is located on state-managed public land adjacent to an interstate that runs through the city.

The Monday following Japan’s deadly earthquake, tsunami, and unfolding nuclear nightmare, we bought fish for our first family aquarium. Jennifer and the girls and I pored over the beautiful swimmers at a pet store in Seaside, Oregon, evacuated three days prior.

An employee’s helpful advice about keeping a healthy tank was a welcome counter-balance to the grief and worry hanging over us. The catastrophe in Japan came less than three weeks after a smaller quake did serious damage in New Zealand. Are we next in line for tectonic turmoil?

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”                   -- Mother Teresa

Dudes are notoriously lame when it comes to Valentine’s Day. Over the years, my actions and inactions have placed me among the ranks of Troglodites who ignore or defame the meaning of this celebration.

The rich inner experience of Christmas is coated with a sweet nutty blend of pop culture. Features for the holiday range from angels to elves, from wise men to talking snowmen, from Jesus, Mary, and Joseph to Rudolph, Prancer, and Vixen. Believers bask in the starry wonderment of Christ’s rustic birth while decking the night with merriments as bright as Las Vegas.

Howdy Babe!