Molly Davis's Blog

“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life…”

Psalm 23: 6

Along with his work as a research scientist, my husband fancied himself a bit of an urban farmer, and as part of that fancy he decided to raise some sheep. As a nod to the well known 23rd Psalm, he named his first three Shirley, Goodness, and Mercy. Those sheep followed him all the days of their lives. They trailed behind him, and dogged his steps. One followed him all the way to the stew pot, her hide tanned for a rug. The other two plodded along behind him until old age caught up with them. They weren’t trying to catch him, simply to tag along behind him

Even people who never have or never will crack open a bible have probably heard the 23rd Psalm quoted more than once. They are familiar words, and as with many oft quoted words, after a while they can simply slip in one ear and out the other, taking any real meaning away with them.

So what does it actually mean that goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our lives.? Is it, like Shirley, Goodness and Mercy, to follow after but never catch up to? That’s what they did, and look what all of that following got them. But what if this is a different kind of following? The kind that—as shared by one of my favorite-but-never-actually-met humans, writer, spiritual director, and podcast host Emily P. Freeman, in her Lenten Collection of meditations—means to pursue with purpose? To chase with determination? To run after with the intent to catch? If goodness and mercy are chasing us like that, why wouldn’t we want them to catch us?

These days it can feel like we are walking through a deep valley, shadowed by doubt, despair, and death. If you don’t feel like that now, my guess is that you have at some time in your life. How is it even possible that goodness and mercy can find us there? I don’t know how, but somehow they can and have and do and will. Their job is to catch us, ours is to stop and welcome them when they do. And if goodness and mercy catch us in the midst of whatever else life is brings our way, then we can extend goodness and mercy to the world within our reach. Goodness and mercy don’t mean the absence of darkness. They are the Holy Light that will help us find our way through.

It’s hard for me to know how to pray these days. But for now, my prayer—for me, for you, for those I know, and those I don’t—is that goodness and mercy will chase us and catch us. That they will find us, and bless and keep us, as long as we all shall live.

Amen.

Written with deep gratitude to Emily P. Freeman, and her presence and companionship along my way.

Photo by Tom Pierson, on our trek near the Bridge of Orchy, Scotland.

I have a tiny following of wonderful souls who travel with me in my musings, and it’s always insightful to see what grabs their attention enough to warrant a comment or a question. My last post, Indivisible, seemed to be one of those that prompted a response. A collective nodding of heads. A shared recognition of the importance of, and the challenge of, maintaining our connection to one another through the thicks and thins of life’s ebbs and flows. To stay connected, come what may, because somewhere deep inside we know that if we allow ourselves to be separated from one another, what may come is something none of us wants.

The challenge of staying connected to those we love, to those with whom we share a life, an apartment, a friendship, a work project, a neighborhood, a classroom, a community, matters. And yet in this time of political upheaval, chaos, and growing division, doing that is hard work. Maybe some of the hardest work we’ll ever endeavor to do. But endeavor to do so we must if we as a country are to survive, much less thrive.

As is often true, the most important work usually begins close to home. It’s where we have the most to gain, and the most to lose. Which is why it matters so much. I can’t tell you how to do that in your own little corner of the world. I can only tell you that in mine it means choosing to show up and stick around. It means pulling up a chair and staying awhile, and inviting them to do the same. It means sharing a meal, offering to help, pitching in, finding the good and camping on that. It’s sending a text, a card, or an unexpected gift. It means finding common ground, and cultivating it so that understanding, beauty and goodness may grow. It means listening to them with a curious ear and not a suspicious one, knowing that none of us has it all right, and none of us has it all wrong. It’s taking steps, no matter how small, towards and not away from. It means staying quiet when to speak would throw fuel on a destructive fire. It’s opting out of the conversation when to stay in would do more harm than good. It means praying for them and playing with them, crying with them and for God’s sake, laughing with them. It means remembering shared histories, shared stories, and shared memories, and making more of them. It means daring to go first, to show them yours in the hopes that they’ll show you theirs.

Civil servants are front and center these days, and everyone seems to have an opinion about the value they add, or don’t, the good they do, or don’t, the contributions they make or the waste they create. But in America, aren’t we all civil servants? Aren’t we the people meant to serve one another, to be devoted and helpful supporters of the common good, and to do so in a civil and respectful manner? This is not just the work of our government. It’s our work too. The America I want to build will require the collective opening our hearts and ears and homes, setting longer tables and setting up wider tents, building bridges instead of walls, rolling up our patriotic sleeves and digging in and digging deep into American soil upon which we all stand and live and have our being. And it means that we will not, no matter what, allow ourselves to be torn asunder by hatred, fear, power or blame.

We. too, are America’s Civil Service, the essential workers needed to preserve, protect, and further our democracy. And no one can fire us, furlough us, or force our resignation.

Written with love, gratitude and deep respect for all those helping us stick together.

Recently, the four of us were sitting in front of a blazing fire. The fireplace at my sister and brother-in-law’s home was built in the same style and by the same stone mason who built ours, 15 years before theirs. A great design, there was no need for change. It is one of the central features of their beautiful, custom home, as it is in ours. A beautiful home built by the same builder who built ours, 15 years before theirs. While their home was built with many of the best design features of our home, it also includes a few of the changes we wish we had had the good sense to make back when we built it.

What is true of building a fireplace and a home is true of building a country. Many things are worth protecting and preserving, while some would benefit from thoughtful change. Knowing when to do which requires diverse perspectives working together to achieve a common goal for the common good.

We are among the elders of our family, and deeply value so many of the same things. Over the years we have parented together, navigated challenges that have arrived on our doorsteps together, grieved together, and celebrated together. It’s hard to imagine our life, and the life of our greater family, without each other.

Gathered in front of a fire or around the dinner table, our conversations usually center on the goings on in our families, the adventures we are planning, projects we are undertaking, and of course, the various medical issues that come with the accumulation of our years. However, on this particular evening the conversation turned political. After a few quiet moments, my husband began to share his deep concern and borderline depression about the state of our country at this moment in our shared history. It is territory we tread lightly as we find ourselves on different sides of the ever widening political aisle. The conversation wasn’t centered on a particular hot-button issue, but rather the state of each of our hearts as we contemplated the state of our fragile union. We spoke cautiously but openly, listened deeply, and worked hard to stay in the conversation rather than retreating to safer ground.

It was good.

It was hard.

It was courageous.

It was scary.

And, it was uncomfortable.

Because we live in the midst of forces hellbent on pulling us apart based on our political leanings, being on the same side of an issue with the people we care about is so much easier. So much more comfortable. It feels safer because we can all agree on a common enemy. We can sit in front of a blazing fire, cozy in our beliefs, confirming our biases, safe in our shared points of view, and free to support the right people and blame the other ones.

It’s US here in front of the fire vs THEM out there in the cold.

However.

That night in front of the fire, or on any given day, that is not the case for us. Not because it couldn’t happen, but because we refuse to let it happen. Sitting there in front of a shared fire, we realized that as hard as it can be and as uncomfortable as it can feel, choosing to stay connected in the midst of our differences is what will preserve this country we love. Refusing to be separated by the powerful and frightening forces working to pull us apart, is what will hold this country together. America’s greatness lies in her diversity. Our differing views and experiences are needed so that we can protect and preserve what is worth keeping for the good of all, and bring about thoughtful change where needed for the good of all.

America is at her best when we stand together, and at her worst when we allow ourselves to be pulled apart.

America isn’t made up of us and them, but of we the people.

If we are ever to achieve that far off aspiration of being a country indivisible, with liberty and justice for all, it isn’t up to them

It’s up to us.

This morning we drove the 45 minutes it takes to get to our church. Not going was not an option. We needed to sit together with one another to find solace in community, rest for our weary souls, and renewal to keep on keeping on when the going can feel so tough.

Ours is a beautiful gathering of perfectly imperfect humans. Open and affirming, the doors open to all, we are a community of people on individual spiritual journeys that can best be traveled together. We don’t all agree on everything, except for one thing.

We agree on Love.

The kind of love that has the power to move mountains, no matter how slowly. The kind that calls us to not just talk about love, but to actually be love to the world within our reach. The kind that chooses to love others, even those, perhaps especially those, with whom we disagree. It’s a tough love, and not for the faint of heart.

There’s a time when a microphone is passed around for people to share prayers of concern, and prayers of joy and thanksgiving. Listening to what was on the hearts of others about the goings on in our world, I didn’t think I had anything to add. Until I did. I wasn’t going to raise my hand for the microphone. Until I did. The words that came out were unexpected. It wasn’t that I found the words to say, it was that the words that wanted to be said found me. And once they found me, I couldn’t not say them.

What if we choose love as an act of resistance?

We all have people in our lives who we love but who see the world differently than we do, perhaps voted differently than we did, and who want things to change in ways that we don’t, or stay the same in ways that we want to change.

I could feel heads nodding all around me. The way heads nod when we hear something true.

What if we refuse to be separated from those we love?

What if we choose to stay as closely connected with them as we are able, and give each other grace for the times we will most certainly fall short of the best of our intentions?

What if we mobilize our love for one another as an act of resistance to the political and power-hungry forces hell-bent on pulling us apart?

There is no power greater than love.

Not unless we give it away.

Let’s not do that.

Let’s choose love as an act of resistance.

Amen.

I couldn’t figure out how to put all the puzzle pieces of my week together. There were things to do, places to go, and people to see, but I couldn’t work out how to make it all come together. The harder I tried to see my way to a solution, the cloudier it all became.

Rather than spinning in mental circles while staring at my calendar, I decided to take a walk with God and one of Her/His/Their favorite dogs, Gracie-the-chocolate labradoodle. Over time I’ve learned that a walk outside can be the fastest route to new ideas, creative solutions, and a general clearing of the mental and emotional cobwebs that can gum up my thinking. Throwing on my boots and pulling on a warm jacket and wool beanie, we headed down our road. White snow, blue sky, green pine trees, and crisp, cold air, it was a spectacular winter morning. With each step my grip on the puzzle pieces of my time loosened, freeing them to begin to shift and move together in ways I hadn’t even imagined, much less considered. By the time I got back to the house I had a clear picture of how to proceed.

Same puzzle pieces, different picture.

When you purchase a puzzle there is only one way to put the pieces together to create the picture on the cover of the box. Doing it the one-and-only right way is the one-and-only goal, and can become our one-and-only approach to the puzzle that is our life. But we don’t arrive on the planet as a bunch of pieces in a box to be put together in a certain way once and for all. The beauty of being human is that we get to be the creators of our own lives, arranging and rearranging our puzzle as we allow our experiences to inform and transform us.

Because we can be prone to doing whatever it is in the way in which we’ve always done it, we might lose sight of the possibility of rearranging our pieces as makes sense in the here and nowness of our life. In our relationships, our work, our spiritual lives, our daily habits, rituals and rhythms, our creative endeavors, and our own inner workings, we have the amazing gift of discovering new ways to put it all together. To arrange our pieces so that they better connect who we are with how we live. But only if we loosen our grip on the pieces, and let them begin to shift and move in ways we hadn’t even imagined, much less considered.

Same puzzle pieces, different picture.

A walk outside can be a good place to start.

Ice Puddle Puzzle from our walk on the road.

This morning as I was snowshoeing out in our field—Gracie-the chocolate-labradoodle racing and romping with the kind of unabashed joy coveted by humans—cap clouds were beginning to form over Mt. Adams. Cap clouds (also referred to as lenticular clouds) form as strong winds flow over the mountain, pushing moist air upward where it cools and condenses into clouds.

Good weather forecasters, cap clouds often indicate a weather change is on the way. Knowing that a storm is brewing helps us prepare for what is to come, whether that be stocking up on food supplies, battening down the hatches, checking up on an elderly neighbor, or throwing in extra layers before heading down the road. Cap clouds alert mountain climbers of potentially, dangerous and possibly life threatening conditions, much like our National Weather Service* serves as an early warning system for us and our neighbors near and far.

This morning with Mt Adams looming in the near distance, if a storm was on the way, it wasn’t here yet. Just the clouds that suggested one might be coming. But for now, the sun was shining, the snow sparkling, and the field in perfect condition for snowshoeing. Gracie noticed none of the warning signs, intent only on the smells of the critters burrowed beneath the snow, the open spaces in which to cavort, and the ball I pulled out of my pocket for her to retrieve. Come what may in the hours ahead, she was hellbent on enjoying what was right here, right now.

Not a bad way to go through life as a human either. Not that we should live with our head in the clouds of denial or buried in the sands of despair, but rather that we heed the warnings of stormy weather ahead, and care well for ourselves and our fellow human beings. Whatever the storms, we will weather them together in the world that we inhabit together. And while we’re at it, let’s choose to live with as much unabashed joy as our human hearts can muster. Like Gracie-the-chocolate labradoodle.

This is an unpaid political announcement. Call your elected officials and tell them to protect and support the important, life-saving, and non-partisan work of NOAA , which includes the National Weather Service .

It all started when Tom was getting ready to retire from a 40 year civil service career as a research scientist for the United States Geological Survey.* It was going to mean a drastic change for our lives in almost every imaginable way, and rather than let this new way of life have its way with us, we decided to find our own way with it.

We booked a cabin at the beach for what we were calling our Pre-Retirment Summit, and came up with the following three questions:

1. What did we want retirement life to look like?

2. What were we excited about?

3. What were we anxious about?

There weren’t a lot of rules to the whole thing other than to show up with open hearts, open minds, lots of Sleepy Monk Coffee, daily walks on the beach, and of course, good food and wine. It was good work, hard work, fun work, and sometimes painful work, as we engaged in the kind of honest, sometimes raw, and always vulnerable conversation that partnership requires. What emerged out of that first summit was a blueprint for post-retirement life. More than simply a strategic planning session, it was another layer of our initial until-death-do-us-part vow. This is who and how we want to be in the world, separately and together, and this is how we will endeavor to do that.

The work done over morning coffee, afternoon walks, and evening wine served as a filter for our choices in the days and years ahead. It helped us get a handle on how we wanted to spend our time and be good stewards of our lives It also gave us a better shot at living with and loving each other well— however imperfectly at times.

The power of that summit was heading home having landed on lots of the same pages. Not all the pages, but the ones where we weren’t were fodder for the never ending work of becoming better humans together. It equipped us to better handle all that retirement from a long and meaningful career of doing really good work, would throw our way. Tom’s way, as he began to experience the silence and invisibility that comes with no longer being in the room, and the unoccupied hours waiting to be filled with new endeavors. My way, as I suddenly had a partner who was home. All. The. Time. And the new practice of making decisions together rather than running my own show. Our way, as we began to encounter rough edges, identify smooth ones, and discover new growing edges. And, it was that summit that helped us begin to establish the rhythms and rituals that would stitch our new life together, together.

We’ve held a summit every year since. The questions shift and evolve, but the process remains. So much of our time, focus, and energy is spent in the weeds of our daily. The summit is a chance to both get a bird’s eye view of it all, and to get down into the weeds of it all. To get a glimpse of life as it’s been, how it is right now, and how it might be. And, how it got to be how it’s been, how it is right now, and how to best make it what we hope it to be.

I wish we’d discovered it sooner. As I wander back over our 30 year of life together, I wonder what we might have done differently if we’d held more summits. Taken time to take stock, get on as many same pages as possible, and even more intentionally chart our course. None of our runways to whatever comes after this life are getting shorter, and while it’s never too late to start the practice of the summit, it’s also never too soon.

The power of the summit is in the dedicated time to reflect on what matters, and figure out how to even better connect who we are with how we live.

The power of the summit is in the conversations as much as what comes out of those conversations.

The power of the summit is in the freedom that is found when we don’t simply let life have its way with us, but rather find our way with it.

The power of the summit isn’t in the plans and to-do lists that emerge, but in knowing what those plans and to-do lists serve.

The power of the summit is…well… you tell me after you’ve tried one.

Side note: A summit doesn’t require a plus-one. Nothing wrong and plenty right with a summit for one.

Pre-Retirement Summit - 2018

This is an unpaid political announcement: Civil servants do important, non-partisan work on behalf of all of our citizens, often working long hours and at lower pay than they would in the private sector. Call your elected officials and tell them to value, support, and protect our civil servants.

I’m a crier. Always have been. Always will be. But lately I’v even been outdoing myself. It is as if the waterproofing of my heart and soul have worn out, and the tears just keep leaking through. Sad ones, fearful ones, joyful ones, grateful ones, and WTF ones. Rather than holding them back, I’m choosing to simply allow the tears to fall as they wish. And boy do they wish.

I started to notice it when my husband and I had a conversation about the long-promised-but-yet-to-be-built dining room table. The table is a subject for another day, but suffice it to say that his suggestions about how we might tweak the agreed upon design, or re-arrange our great room opened the floodgates. At first the tears were ones of anger, even rage. But over time, as we sat at the hopefully-someday-to-be-replaced table, they turned into tears of sadness, pain, fear, and loss. I simply couldn’t stop crying, and probably shed more tears at that table than Tom has in his entire life. At one point he quietly asked—probably holding his hands up to shield himself in case I threw something at him—“Mol, do you think this might be about more than the table?” Ya think?

Of course it was. It’s almost always about more than the whatever it is. The table was simply the dam that broke and let everything else out. Everything else included all the things I didn’t realize I’d been carrying. Pain for important and necessary struggles in the lives of those I love. Fear for our country, our world, and our planet. Sadness for the responsibility I bear (and you do to) for the state in which we collectively find ourselves. Grief for the losses that are sure to come.

And.

Tears of joy found in the gathering together with family and friends, the celebrating of milestones and moments, and the surprises that fill our cups. Tears of happiness that arrive with shared cups of coffee, home cooked meals, good news of any sort (it’s there if we look for it), laughter, help that arrives unbidden, and answered prayers. Tears of gratitude for the raising of good humans, the loving of one anther, and the agency to live and work for a world, and a country, in which all are seen, represented, and welcomed.

There are plenty of reasons for even the non-crieriest among us to shed a tear or two. The world is a mess. Our country is a mess. And if we’re honest, most (ok, all) of us are a mess in one way or another. I’m not saying everyone has to turn into a weeper like me. But every tear holds a message. They signal the things that matter to us, clear our vision, and spur us to action. They connect us to one another, pave the way for deeper understanding, and communicate what words sometimes can’t.

Tears open our hearts in a way that holding them in never will.

It is said that God saves all of our tears in a bottle. I sure hope She has a huge one for mine.

The entryway to our home has never been an important space. A space in which I’ve wanted to linger. A space into which I’ve wanted to welcome guests. It’s simply been a space through which to pass, multiple times, as we go about our daily rounds.

I am a person to whom space matters, and yet somehow transforming this small but central space escaped my attention. Until it didn’t.

As with most things, its transformation began with one thing. A photo of the logging road that we have been hiking faithfully ever since the pandemic. It began simply as a way to build our endurance, but over the course of walking that same path, witnessed by those same trees, it has become a kind of pilgrimage. A holy trek upon ground that will faithfully bear whatever we carry, and somehow lighten, and enlighten us in the process. Next came a drawing of Mt. Adams, the mountain in whose shadow we sit, and upon whose slopes we’ve climbed with people we love. Finally, a picture capturing the partnership Tom and I have somehow managed to build, despite our many flaws and foibles, over our thirty years of loving each other. A trip to Pottery Barn for inspiration yielded just the narrow table needed, at a floor model price. Shopping our home resulted in a small lamp to shed soft light, a glass candle holder first purchased for the weddings of a couple of daughters, acorns gathered as symbols of new life to come, a tiny vial of holy oil as we are all in need of healing, and art pieces made by loving hands.

The space was completed on January 19th.

On January 20th, as we headed out to the porch for our morning coffee in the dark, I lit the candle to remind us of the light that will shine in any darkness, no matter how black. In that moment, that transformed space became an altar.

An altar I didn’t know I needed. Until I did.

The altar is now the place upon which to set my prayers. All of them. A space upon which to lay down the burdens of my sadness and grief and pain and fear, leaving them in hands much greater than mine. It is also the space upon which I place my thanks, my faith in the Love that is greater than any evil, and my gratitude for the privilege of being alive. Right now. At this exact moment in our shared history.

All left at the altar, my heart has the space to take in all the beauty, wonder, joy, and love found in the world around and within me.

All left at the altar, I can better encounter the world with a willing heart, an open mind, a ready laugh, the tears that need to be shed, and hands ready to do what is mine to do. To actively work to create a world, and a country, that I want to inhabit.

All left at the altar, I can be present to who and what are before me. To, in the words of Diana Butler Bass, go out and Love relentlessly.

I didn’t know I needed an altar.

Until I did.

Maybe you might need one too.

(Written with gratitude to Katie M for helping me bring the altar into being.)

I love words. So when the world feels like it is falling apart, I look for the words that will help me keep it together. Words that help me make sense of things, stay just the tiniest bit grounded, or remind me of who I am, why I’m here, and how I want to show up in the world, no matter how messed up it seems. Never has that been more true than now. As 2025 unfolds before us a new administration is soon to be at the helm of our floundering American ship, wildfires rage, and division and disinformation run rampant.

I need some words upon which to hang my well-worn hat.

As it turns out, I might only need one word.

It’s a new word. As in a newly, never-before-heard word, coined by our almost seven year old grandson.

He’s had a bit of a rough go of it for the past little while. Add your regular run of the mill sniffles, coughs, and ear infections to interrupted sleeps by everyone in the house. Throw in a newly discovered allergy to dust mites requiring an overhaul of almost everything, and then top it all off with a broken collarbone. That’s a lot to manage under one roof, much less in the body of a little boy.

One morning, after a particularly rough night, his mom gave him a big scoop of coconut cream, a favorite in anyone’s book who has even a modicum of taste. Savoring all that creamy goodness in the midst of the mess, out popped the word.

Hullabloojah!

As our daughter noted, it’s the perfect combination of gratitude in the midst of chaos.

Hullabloojah!

I love that word.

Hullabloojah!

Life is never one thing. It is always a mixture of the good, the bad, and the seriously ugly. Prone as we are to camp on the bad, the scary, the ugly, the imagined, or the dreaded, we need a word to shake us up and bring us back to ourselves. A word upon which we can hang our well-worn hats, come what may.

Hullabloojah!

(Written with gratitude for Cai and the best word ever.)