Greenblade - creation - faith - justice

Beauty and the Beets

I want to leave the Senegal narrative for a moment to jump back into the joy of eating seasonally and locally in Ithaca in the winter. This year, after a dismal harvest from my own garden (due in part from my own preoccupation with new motherhood as well as to a 3 week cross-country vacation at the end of June and beginning of July), I decided to sign up for Blue Heron Farm's winter subscription. We had belonged to a wonderful CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) while living in Boston, but between our own harvests, produce from friend's gardens and enjoying trips to the Ithaca Farmer's Market, we hadn't yet considered joining a farm here. However, I knew from experience last year that as winter settles itself firmly around us, Greenstar starts carrying less and less local produce. Already you can't find local cabbages or carrots and many of the winter squashes come from Canada or elsewhere. So at the ... MORE

People and Pilgrims

My first journey to Senegal was important to me in numerous ways and has shaped the way that I think about life - relationships, kinship, religion and spirituality, and the role of daily prayer. My eyes were opened to a new culture at a time when I was ready to soak it all in. In life after Senegal, I've had the opportunity to travel and work for varying amounts of time in half a dozen other countries around the world, but it always seems that the lessons I draw on most in my life are from that original trip to Senegal. (Although my cooking probably draws a lot more from my year in Bangladesh!)

You have to try really hard to be lonely in Senegal. It is a rare home where you will find a lone person, instead most family compounds are teeming with life - indeed the fact that most families live in "compounds" rather ... MORE

Sheep and Sacrifice

Despite my good intentions, I was never able to get my act together enough to write, let alone submit, any posts to my column during my three week journey after Christmas to Senegal with my family. However, the whole time I was there, ideas and images were in front of me that I knew would provide much fodder for a column such as this. While I started journaling about the experience there for my daughter who was making her first trip to Africa before she turned a year old, there are other things that I want to reflect on as a person of faith since in many ways Senegal is my spiritual home.

My first journey to Senegal was after I graduated from Cornell with my Bachelor's degree in 1998. In fact, the Episcopal Church at Cornell gave me a small scholarship that helped this experience happen. I volunteered with the budding non-governmental organization, now primarily ... MORE