It was in Lisbon, at an Argentine restaurant, that I first felt my conscience stir. Above my table hung a large painting of a cow’s face, its eyes meeting mine as I ate a plate of beautifully prepared beef carpaccio. The meal was exquisite, the setting warm and convivial, yet I found myself oddly unsettled. I kept looking up at the painting, then back down at my plate, aware of a quiet tension I couldn’t immediately name.

Not long after that evening, I began to notice a subtle shift in myself. At the market, meat no longer appeared as it once had. I would think, Yes, I love a steak, and then hesitate—seeing not just the food, but the animal behind it, as if it were looking back at me again.

Lately, I’ve found myself quietly turning away from meat. I look at it in the market and think, Oh yes, I love a steak—but then the price is too high, and at the same time I have this image of the cow looking at me. The same thing happens with lamb chops, with chickens, with pork. I find myself imagining each animal, as if it were asking, “Why me?”
So I thought perhaps I should try being vegetarian. But the truth is, I’m not especially fond of many vegetable-only dishes, and that makes the idea less appealing. I began asking myself what it is about meat that is bothering me, and I think it comes down to that moment of recognition—the sense of the animal as a living being, not just food.

My son is a farmer, and he raises animals for meat. He and his family are very careful about how their animals live and about whom they use for processing. They believe—and I trust—that the animals are treated humanely. I know this is worlds apart from industrial livestock practices, which I find deeply disturbing. There is something important to me about animals being well cared for during their lives and handled with compassion at the end.

These thoughts led me to ask my usual source—AI—about when and why humans began eating meat. What I learned made sense to me. Meat was available. Early humans observed other animals hunting and eating prey. As they developed tools and skills, they were able to hunt or scavenge animals themselves. With the discovery of fire, they could cook meat, making it easier to digest and more appealing. Seen this way, eating meat was not a moral decision but a matter of survival.

Today, of course, the situation is different. For many of us, eating meat is a choice—and therefore potentially a moral one. That’s where I find myself uncertain. I’m not quite able to commit to avoiding meat entirely. I worry about getting enough protein. I’m not very fond of soy, and although I adore cheese, I’ve been warned to limit it because of cholesterol issues. I do love nuts and eat them often, but I’m not convinced that a fully vegetarian diet is right for me.

So for now, I’m thinking rather than deciding. I’m trying to balance my desire to reduce animal suffering with the need to nourish myself properly at this stage of life. At nearly 84, with low bone density and high cholesterol, this feels less like a moral puzzle with a clear answer and more like a careful, ongoing negotiation.
​
I’ve decided, at least for now, not to decide. I’m allowing the question to stay with me, rather than pushing it toward a resolution that doesn’t yet feel true. At nearly 84, I’m learning that not every question needs an answer—some ask instead for presence. I want to remain awake to animal suffering and equally awake to my own need for nourishment, and to move forward with care for animals, for my aging body, and for the complicated space where those concerns meet. For now, I’m content to live with the question, trusting that attention itself is a form of compassion.

Maybe this is a clue:

Recurrent dream of familiar house with so many unfamiliar rooms! Astounded by so many unknown possibilities. The original house was reminiscent of Knollbrook Way home when I was a teenager.

Was this the storehouse of who I am, who we are?

Who do I think I am vs who I can or could be? Or am simultaneously?

A friend asked how would I define intuition. I think it draws from this “house” full of experience/possibilities. When I go back to recreate past experiences, they shed light on the past or my memory of the past. When I share with my sister, she doesn’t remember it like that. When discussing intimate thoughts with another friend, she says she could never go there. Maybe in other words she could not enter that house. Her pain is too deep and she refuses to go there? So can we only intuit if we allow ourselves to go there. We know some people have extensive intuition. Is that what they are born with or where they allow themselves to go? Women are sometimes credited with greater intuition. This is sometimes seen in our favor and sometimes used against us by those who want to just stick with the facts.

The ability to move from reality/the visible or that which can be proven by acceptable knowledge, to let’s say dreamlike sensibility, is that related to gender, dna, culture? Pessoa probably had a strong feminine side as do many poets I suppose but let’s not go too far astray at this moment.

I know I have always been fascinated by the notion of simultaneous realities and as in Alice in Wonderland, the potential to travel between them. (Wind Up Bird Chronicles, Haruki Murakami?) I imagine a thick fog obliterating the lines between simultaneous worlds. I feel this aligns a bit with Jung’s travel to the unconscious and many ideas of dream reality. There was also that dream of entering a room and tripping on a rug, plunging into a dark hole. I repeated that dream numerous times., same door, same hole. I remember my repeated dream of the Hotel Imperial on the Reforma of Mexico City (before I ever saw it in real life) in search of my ex husband (the past) and the University (knowledge?) always in vain. Many other dreams that seemed so real I wondered if the people involved remembered them as well. They were meaningful and transforming. 

So what is the reality of this moment? Of last night’s dreams?
Where does intuition come from? We say I feel like… is true. Maybe it’s all true.


Countless lives inhabit us.
I don't know, when I think or feel, 
Who it is that thinks and feels. 
I am merely the place
Where things are thought and felt. 


Fernando Pessoa

Image of Empire of Lights by René Magritte—Rene Magritte painted this house over 30 times, each slightly different. Did he have the same dream I had? And is this his mystery house?

National Autonomous University of Mexico that was in my dream

Hotel Imperial on Reforma in Mexico City that I dreamed before ever seeing it. Attempting  to understand my past and pursue knowledge?

After a nice pre-Christmas visit, my son and his family, who live in Sebastopol, took advantage of being in the Oakland–Berkeley area to visit one of their favorite pizza places. While there, he sent me a photo of a picture displayed at Zachary’s Pizza on College Avenue near the Rockridge BART station.

“Look who is here,” he wrote.

He had mistaken the figure in the picture for Fernando Pessoa, and when I saw it, I understood why. The resemblance was striking. But tipped off by the bowler hat (Pessoa always wore a fedora) and the red tie (far too extravagant for Fernando), I recognized the man as René Magritte — another favorite of mine.

Magritte famously questioned the nature of what we see reproduced versus the real object itself: the reality of what we think we see versus the thing’s own reality. His best-known example is the painting of a pipe accompanied by the words Ceci n’est pas une pipe — “This is not a pipe.”

As the curator of an SFMOMA exhibition explained, “the canvas highlights the fact that the viewer isn’t looking at a pipe, but a picture of a pipe. Far from a petty provocation, the distinction gets at the difference between art and reality.”

That idea reappears elsewhere in Magritte’s work, particularly in paintings that show scenery framed by a window. I’m reminded of something similar in the paintings of Antonio Costa Pinheiro, especially those depicting Fernando Pessoa. In both cases, I find myself wondering whether the act of framing a subject — a statue, a ship, a person — subtly removes it from reality. Does a frame announce: this is not the thing itself, but your interpretation of it?

Magritte was influenced by the Surrealists in Paris and moved from Brussels for a time to immerse himself in the movement. Yet a certain rigidity within Surrealism eventually sent him back to Belgium. He was also deeply affected by the stark, minimalist works of Giorgio de Chirico. That economy of detail, along with their shared metaphysical concerns about reality, is evident in much of Magritte’s work.

So Fernando Pessoa and René Magritte, de Chirico and, most likely, Antonio Costa Pinheiro — without conspiring — were drawn to the same question: reality versus the ways our interpretations shape it. For all of them, I suspect, the answers lay within the mind, and they remained in constant pursuit of some ultimate truth.

As curator Caitlin Haskell writes in the SFMOMA catalogue, Magritte “asks viewers to reevaluate their acceptance of what they see… and as rapidly improving technology amplifies our ability to realistically distort images, it’s more important than ever to consider what is a pipe, and what’s not.”

I find myself agreeing with Magritte’s doubts — that the world as we see it differs from what we are told we see through replication. Is that too strange a thought? I remember once asking my mother whether the reflection we see in a mirror is the same as how others see us. She didn’t want to deal with that question. I still raise it from time to time, though not too often — largely in the interest of keeping the peace.

It may be true that you can never go back to a place because the past is the people and the experiences more than the physical landscape. 

When it all changes, what is left? Only the memories interpreted by our current minds? 

I write to remember those illusive passages of time only to find they may exist only inside me. The one who experienced them. 

Maybe life is not what we live but what we imagine we have lived.

People we knew either don’t exist or exist without any recognition or memory of us. Is that why we can never find them? 

Perhaps you have to write about them to find them. Then maybe they will remember. Kind of like putting out photos on Day of the Dead but they may not be dead, just missing.

I do indeed look for people I think about from the past but as the world has become almost entirely digital, many people seem to have disappeared from view. 

I did find someone who I thought of yesterday. I was encouraged by a line and link from an article I wrote a few years ago titled My Love Affair with Mexico wherein I mentioned a trip my first husband and I took with his brother and sister in law to Mexico. 

Completely out of the blue we hooked up with two young men from the east coast who agreed to travel with us to Mexico City sharing expenses. One of them, Tony Kahn, made a huge impression on me and at the time I wrote the article I looked him up and found him. I had included a link to his website in my article. 

Tony who had been working on his doctoral thesis on Trotsky in Mexico at Harvard when I met him, documented his and his screen writer family’s experiences during the McCarthy era in the United States. His fathers name was Gordon Kahn. He was a very highly regarded and popular screen writer until the House of Un-American Activities got very busy on their mission to “so-called” cleanse the film industry of supposed communist elements. By the way, we are talking such subversive films as Tarzan! 

I revisited the program Blacklisted by Tony Kahn yesterday and was so impressed both by the family’s resilience and Tony’s detailed and personal  telling of the story that I highly recommend your following this link to discover what destruction so many people experienced due to the relentless persecution of innocent people during the anti Communist scare of the 50’s. Many of us read and heard of what was going on as children and were frightened by the propaganda spread on the radio during the period however the detailed personal suffering of the victims was not presented nor understood by us.

https://www.tonykahn.org/blacklisted

Tony addresses the ostracism and fear experienced by his family in school or anywhere in public as well as the economic hardship suffered due to not being allowed to work once targeted by the McCarthy war of terror on members of the film industry and later universities and other influential  organizations. Once a happy, comfortable family of four, they became hated “commies” in the US and unwanted “Gringos” in  their adopted home in Mexico. That is a lot for a family to endure.

The story is eye opening and tragic and yet told without bitterness.

Gordon Kahn was loyal and committed to truth and to revealing the truth throughout his short life. His only goal was to provide for his family and uphold his values even when faced with such adversity. Five foot two and 120 pounds, no bigger than I am, he was a giant in his support of democracy and freedom of thought and expression.

Today I read in the news that the FBI under the Trump regime is making a list of all left “extremists” in the United States. I guess that means anyone who has participated in an anti war protest, rally to raise wages, against unwarranted police brutality, etc.
Well I guess that is me and I am quite proud of it.
Is this here we go again?


Quote of praise of the project:

With an all-star cast including Stockard Channing, Eli Wallach, Ron Leibman, Carroll O‘Connor, Jerry Stiller, and Julie Harris, "Blacklisted" used the power of radio to immerse listeners in the experience of the political and personal dramas of the time.  Featured in articles by Newsweek, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, and The Washington Post, “Blacklisted”was also praised by many listeners as one of the most riveting radio dramas they had ever heard.

In 1973, when Guadalajara still had spacious edges and room for dreams, we discovered a little paradise taking shape just beyond its northern limits. Bosques de San Isidro was not yet the sprawling suburb it would eventually become. Back then, it was a family-guided vision — the work of the gracious and imaginative Ramírez family — and those of us who joined it felt as though we had stepped inside a small, private world.


My husband was Mexican, and through our circle of friends we came to know the Ramírez family well. They were warm, cultured people who welcomed everyone with a natural ease. Señora Ramírez herself shaped much of the landscape of the golf course — eighteen beautifully sculpted holes that followed the natural lay of the land, woven into the hills and creeks. She created something more like a garden than a golf course: elegant, quiet, and profoundly human.


When our daughter was born in 1973, we often drove out to San Isidro with her — a tiny baby nestled beside us — and each time the place felt a little more alive. A modest house for Bing Crosby was being built then: simple, tasteful, nothing ostentatious. Behind it, an amphitheater was taking shape, intended for the music of Pablo Casals. It sounds almost mythic now, but at the time it fit perfectly with the spirit of the place — a community where art, friendship, and landscape all intertwined.


Crosby’s involvement, I later came to understand, may have helped secure the financing that allowed the early years to flourish. After his death in 1977, the strain on the bank loan created troubles that eventually pushed the Ramírez family to relocate to Tijuana. But during those bright early years, none of us knew that. We were simply living our days in a joyful rhythm.


And what days they were.


The men often disappeared onto the golf course for hours, following the curves of those eighteen lovingly designed holes. The clay tennis courts were always alive with motion, the soft sound of play punctuated by young boys darting across the surface to chase down stray balls. The moms and children gathered around the pretty round pool encircled by bougainvillea and bright flowers — a ring of color that seemed to glow in the warm Guadalajara light. It was a safe, happy world where children were free and laughter came easily.


After long afternoons of sun, play, and visiting, we all drifted toward the little clubhouse. It was not grand — just comfortable and full of charm — and it became our evening gathering place. Meals were shared, music flowed, and sometimes someone would start dancing. It didn’t need planning; it was simply how the evenings unfolded, naturally and warmly, among friends who felt like family.


We continued to visit Crosby’s house even after he passed away, because a member of the Ramírez family lived there. It remained exactly what it had been planned to be: a simple, graceful place that fit the land and the spirit of San Isidro.


By 1978, our time at Bosques de San Isidro was coming to a close. Many things had changed — the Ramírez family was relocating, and the wider world was encroaching on the quiet paradise we had loved.


But in my heart — and in the memories of all who lived it — Bosques de San Isidro remains what it once was: a brief, shimmering paradise. A place shaped by good people, good will, beauty, and possibility. A place where families gathered, children thrived, music played, and friendships deepened under the bougainvillea and the warm evening lights.


And perhaps what shines brightest now, all these years later, are the evenings we spent with our Mexican friends — the warmth of their welcome, the easy humor, the tacos passed around with laughter, and the music that always found its way into the night. Sometimes a small band would appear, and often our architect friend brought out his guitar. He would coax us to sing, and I, who was not inclined to put myself forward, somehow found my courage there. I would sing Yesterday — the one song I trusted myself to remember and I guess an appropriate one for my memories — and they received it with such affection and delight that I felt not like a visitor, but like one of their own.


That is the heart I carry from those years: not only the beauty of the place, but the generosity of the people who opened their circle to us. For five unforgettable years, it was our refuge, our joy, and our little paradise on the edge of a changing city — made luminous by landscape, friendship, and the gentle gift of belonging.

Every so often in life, we meet someone who seems to bypass all the usual stages of acquaintance and step straight into the inner room. That was how it was with my friend Darrel McLeod. From the moment we met, there was a recognition—not dramatic or sudden, but immediate and unmistakable. It was the recognition of someone who lived with an inner life as vivid as my own.

Darrel was a writer, and perhaps that helped. Writers tend to cultivate a certain fearlessness about truth; they live at the edge of memory, emotion, and story. But he was also generous in a way that had nothing to do with craft. He shared his life openly, as a Cree man from British Columbia, telling stories that were layered with history, struggle, resilience, and extraordinary clarity. He didn’t speak about himself so much as from himself. There is a difference, and it’s a rare one.

Over the couple of years we spent together—listening to music, exchanging books, discussing literature and writing—I never once felt the distance that so often exists between people. Our conversations were effortless, full of curiosity, honesty, humor, and a sense of mutual understanding that felt both grounding and exhilarating. I never wondered whether he was listening. I never felt the need to shrink or simplify myself. I never doubted that he understood exactly what I meant.

He was, in every sense, the friend I had always longed for.

When he died, suddenly and far too young, the loss felt impossible to hold. It wasn’t just a grief for the person he was, but for the kind of presence he brought into the world—one that is not easily replaced, and maybe cannot be. I still miss him. I miss the ease of our conversations, the trust, the shared inner landscapes. I miss the rare feeling of being met exactly where I live inside myself.

His absence makes moments of superficial connection feel even thinner. And it reminds me, again and again, that when someone like Darrel appears in one’s life, even briefly, it is a gift of the highest order. A reminder that true understanding is possible. That soul-recognition is real. And that when we have known that level of companionship, we carry it with us always.
​
In the final weeks of his life, Darrel was in a period of extraordinary creative unfolding. He was only a few weeks away from publishing his fourth book — his second novel — and he was stepping boldly into a dream he had carried since he was young: becoming a jazz singer.

The very week he passed, he performed a concert with friends in Victoria, British Columbia. He hadn’t been feeling well, but he went onstage anyway. And afterward, he told me he was pleased with how he sang — genuinely pleased. There was a quiet pride in it, as if he knew he was stepping into a new chapter of himself, one that blended the storyteller and the musician inside him.

He had also done work in Puerto Vallarta with musician friends, producing some lovely videos that captured both his voice and his spirit. He told me — almost with disbelief — that after a lifetime of struggle, the success of his books meant he was finally living comfortably. And with that comfort came a new possibility: he wanted to spend the next year supporting and promoting some of the local musicians I had been championing for years. He said it with such enthusiasm, such sincerity. With his experience, his connections, and his generosity, I knew he would have been phenomenal. It would have been a beautiful collaboration, and we both sensed that.

That is what makes his passing so difficult to hold. He wasn’t fading — he was blooming. He was entering a vibrant new season of his life, full of promise and creative abundance. And I feel grateful, deeply grateful, that I witnessed that last flourishing. I saw him becoming the fullest version of himself. And I still miss him — not only for who he was, but for the future he was just beginning to step into.

Not long ago, I received a text from someone I hadn’t heard from in years. The message was simple, almost casual, as if he were just checking the weather of my life: How are you? How’s everything? After all that time, it seemed to carry some weight, so I suggested we talk on the phone. We set a time, and he called.

I greeted him warmly: “It’s good to hear your voice. What’s up?” But it became clear very quickly that nothing, in fact, was “up.” He had reached out, but he had no story to tell, no question to ask, no curiosity to follow. The conversation fell into my hands like something fragile and unfinished.

So I began to fill in the gaps—my life lately, the things I’ve been doing, the memories we once shared. I asked about his family and about people we once knew together. I even tried reviving old moments that had made us laugh. But he didn’t remember any of them.

There was a strange hollowness in the call, like talking to someone through a long hallway. Eventually I said, gently, that I didn’t want to take up too much of his time. That’s when he said, “Yes, you do talk a lot.” I hung up, and a question curled its way into my mind: Do I? Is that a flaw?

Later, while revisiting passages from Night Train to Lisbon, I came across a line that struck me with unusual force:

"When we talk about ourselves, about others, or simply about things, we want—it could be said—to reveal ourselves in our words: We want to show what we think and feel. We let others have a glimpse into our soul.”
​
That is exactly how I feel when I speak with people. I reveal myself. I offer something true, something inward, something thoughtful. I invite connection.

Yet not everyone wants to reveal themselves. Many people stay safely on the surface: what happened today, what they saw on the news, a movie, an errand. These are the outer layers, easy to talk about, harmless, unthreatening. But deeper questions—Who are you really? What do you want? What do you fear?—feel dangerous to them. Some avoid those inner spaces because they hold trauma. Others simply never learned the language of self-reflection. And some prefer to leave the soul unnamed.

For me, the more puzzling question is whether people feel unheard because I “talk too much.” That phone call made me wonder. But when I look back honestly, I gave him all the space in the world. He simply didn’t step into it. Perhaps he couldn’t.

The truth is, I speak from a life that has been deeply lived—through literature, memory, inner exploration, Pessoa, Jung, symbolism, dreams, the shifting landscapes of Lisbon and Mexico, the ocean, the patterns of fate. I live with a mind that never stops turning over the meaning of things. Not everyone does. Not everyone can meet a conversation at that depth.

So I’m learning something: It’s not that I talk too much. It’s that I talk from a place that not everyone knows how to reach.

Still, I want to be mindful, to listen closely, to notice who asks questions back and who reveals even a small piece of themselves. But I won’t shrink the parts of me that reflect and remember and speak from the soul. That is who I am.
And maybe that is the season I’m claiming now—a season of speaking honestly, listening generously, and recognizing when a door remains closed not because I knocked too hard, but because the room behind it was never meant for me to enter.
​
These are paintings by the renowned Portuguese painter Antonio Costa Pinheiro from his series honoring the work of Fernando Pessoa 1983 and Landscape of his Atalier 1984. Both very connected to their interior selves.

 Long ago — as the fairytales say — I attended a class taught by a charming and talented man named Jim Hadley at the Piedmont Adult School. Extremely knowledgeable and endlessly prepared, he covered the entire history of Europe over a two-year period. As he moved from Ancient Egypt to the French Revolution, he brought each era to life with lectures, slides, music, and art. His humor made everything both entertaining and deeply informative.

One of my favorite lectures was about octogenarians who accomplished their greatest works after turning eighty. At forty-five, I thought eighty was unimaginably old. But now that I am here, it feels perfectly sensible that after decades of experience — and if blessed with some good health — one might finally be ready to create something meaningful. That idea stayed with me. I promised myself not to collapse into an armchair and wait for life to wind down. Instead, I would do whatever I could to maintain my strength and pursue things that others might consider outlandish for my age.

Not everything I do will benefit society in the way Titian or other late-in-life creators contributed their masterpieces. But I don’t believe that was the point of Jim Hadley’s lecture. The message was simply this: eighty is not a time to doze off. It is a time to stay awake.

For the past four years, I’ve taken a deep breath each September and flown to Lisbon, Portugal. It’s a long journey — especially for me — yet I have never regretted a single trip. I plan to keep going, even when obstacles try to pin me at home.

One of the best decisions I made this year was hiring a personal trainer. I always assumed it would be a frivolous extravagance, but working with Chris has been transformative. By cutting a few unnecessary expenses, I carved out the resources for this small investment, and it has paid off in strength, balance, and confidence. I’m hopeful that when September 2026 arrives, I’ll be stepping onto a plane to Lisbon yet again — ready to see the places, the art, the poetry, and the people who fill me with joy.

Lisbon is a lovely city — physically beautiful, emotionally calming, quietly inspiring. Its architecture, mosaics, the wide sweep of the Tagus River, the Atlantic winds, and the plaintive sounds of Fado have become part of my life’s rhythm. And even if all I do is sit in my condo, walk to the park with a book, enjoy a simple coffee at a kiosk, and let the city breathe around me — I will be content. A change is good. A challenge is even better.

What I discover in Lisbon.
​I  grow closer to the life of my favorite poet, Fernando Pessoa. I visit his old haunts and think of his daily life and inspiration.

I revel in the writings of Jose Saramago and Eca de Queiros, visiting the sources of their inspiration.

I listen to Fado music whenever I get the chance.

I enjoy the views from nearby beaches, the river front at the end of each day and relaxing in the park outside my apartment in the evenings.

Above all, my comfy little home away from home feels so right!

Today I smelled a magnolia blossom for the first time. There are many magnolia trees in my neighborhood, but they’re so tall I’ve never been able to reach one. This morning, on my walk, I spotted a small young tree in bloom.
I bent close and inhaled — the scent was fresh and lemony.

I can’t think of the magnolia without recalling a very poignant song by Billie Holiday, recorded in 1939 — Strange Fruit.
​I found myself wondering: why do I associate the magnolia tree with that song?
After all, the lyrics tell us the “strange fruit” hung from the poplar tree.

Then I remembered: the song’s quiet horror unfolds in a landscape where
“the bulging eyes and the twisted mouth”
contrast with “the scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh.”
That sweetness, meant to bathe the neighborhood in beauty,
is obliterated by the tragic scent of unwarranted death and suffering --
the violence imposed upon Black lives by a supposedly Christian white society.

From now on, the scent of magnolia blossoms will bring to me
the image of tears of Christ — if he is watching.

​

This morning, I took myself to Saint Albert’s Priory—a place I’ve passed hundreds of times. It sits just off College Avenue in the Rockridge district of Oakland on a quiet stretch of Chabot Road near where we once lived on Florio Street. I’ve always admired its calm green lawn and the small stately chapel behind the fence, assuming the large building beyond was a monastery. For years I thought, that’s not a place one simply walks into.

But today, something nudged me. I woke with the feeling that sitting in front of Saint Albert’s might clear my mind and soothe the small sorrows that had gathered lately. So I took BART to Rockridge, had my morning coffee, and walked up toward St. Albert’s. To my surprise, the gates were open—as if the place had been expecting me.

I walked up the path, shaded and winding, and noticed the chapel door slightly ajar. From inside came the sound of choral music, serene and steady. I eased the door open. The space glowed white and gold. At the altar stood perhaps a dozen men in white robes, touched with red and gold, their voices rising in harmony. A full congregation sat along the side pews, absorbed in song or prayer.

I stood quietly and listened. I was enchanted. The music was familiar—Catholic liturgy, yet reminiscent of the Episcopalian services of my childhood. The cadence, the reverence, the shared silence between phrases—it was exactly what I needed.

When the service ended, the men in robes and the priest came out front. I walked up to the one I assumed was the officiating priest—Father Raphael Mary, as it turned out—and thanked him. I told him I had passed Saint Albert’s many times but had never imagined going inside, until today. He smiled warmly and said I was welcome anytime.
​
I admitted it had been more than forty years since I’d attended a church service—not as a tourist admiring art and iconography, but as a participant in worship. I told him I’d been raised Episcopalian but had drifted from organized faith in college, encouraged by a kind priest, Father Neville, who told me simply to “find the answers you can live by.” And that is how I have lived.

Still, standing there in the hush of the chapel, I felt something pure—perhaps not belief, but belonging. I left feeling cleansed.

As I stood outside afterward, words from Night Train to Lisbon came to mind. In it, Amadeu de Prado—a 17 year old confirmed atheist—delivers the graduation speech at his very Catholic school in Lisbon, at a time when the country bowed to the strict authority of Salazar.

“I would not like to live in a world without cathedrals.
I need their beauty and grandeur.
I need their imperious silence.
I need it against the witless bellowing of the barracks yard
and the witty chatter of the yes-men.
I want to hear the rustling of the organ,
this deluge of ethereal notes.
I need it against the shrill farce of marches.”
​
That passage captures exactly what I felt: a yearning for beauty and silence amid the noise of the modern world—the shrill farce of politics, the endless chatter. Even without an organ, the pure a cappella voices at Saint Albert’s offered refuge from all that.

So thank you, Father Raphael Mary, for your kindness, and thank you to the universe for leading me there and opening the door.