William Shakespeare said, “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet”.  Isn’t that the truth?  But in the play Romeo and Juliet, I’m told that Shakespeare was referring to Juliet’s argument that it doesn’t matter that Romeo’s surname is ‘Montague’ from her family’s rival’s ‘house of Montague’.    It made me think about my name – or, my ‘names’.  I was born Dawn Ellen Bean, but have been known by variations of that name, or completely different names according to my relationship with others.

I would never have dreamt in a thousand years that I would be using this space this month for the following:

      Jesse Diauto – Born January 21, 1977 – Died unexpectedly May 22, 2017

I always loved going home for the breaks during my college years. It was HOME! With all its familiarity, I could have navigated through our old New England colonial blindfolded. Nothing ever changed. Everything was right where it supposed to be. The butter and condiments were in the same cupboard. The towels right where they should be in the hall closet. The dog’s dish to the left of the kitchen stove. And my left over high school memoirs still right in the draw where they were first placed. Everything was the same. I loved it!

It is common knowledge that every major religion has a symbol.  I’m sure that we all would recognize each one.  My favorite television quiz program, Jeopardy has had a category more than once covering ‘world religions and their symbols’.  I came across an article recently that put together these religions with their visual symbols in the following succinct manner –

“Not everyone can say (it), but I count myself lucky to have a birth mother who loved me enough to know she wasn’t ready to be a mom. I’m lucky that I have wonderful parents who chose me. I often say adoption is a full-circle blessing and I truly believe it. Adopted children were not abandoned, we were chosen.  – Kristen Chenoweth

This is the ‘Love Month’!   :)   Not only this month, but sometimes I am just flooded with thoughts of all the people I love – too many to mention here.   But, included in those is family, of course.  I have just spent considerable time with my grandbabies, and oh, how we love each other!   And then, outside the ‘norm’, I think of how much I loved, and still love all the homeless folks I worked with for three and a half years in Providence, RI.  I know you know how much I love ‘my’ babies and kids (orphans) in Romania.  I am IN love with them!  And, way ‘outside the box’, people I don’t even know but of whom I read – including Prisoners for Christ in countries around the world.

It was such a cold, blustery Sunday evening several years ago when my boys and I were on our way to church across town for the service.  It was that ‘bitter cold’ that a January offers us in New England.  It wasn’t just freezing, it was literally below freezing!  And besides that we had so much snow that the banks where the plows had tried to keep us free to move about were piled so high that it was nearly impossible to see around a corner to get out of a street.  And, some of the back roads were plowed to only a car and a half-width with the snow frozen on both sides.  These were snow-packed back roads with only an occasional sighting of a glimpse of tar.

I just love the Holiday Season.  From a child, it started with Thanksgiving.  We would draw the cornucopias, fat, colorful turkeys and boy and girl pilgrims at school.  On Thanksgiving Day, the older ones would watch football games most of the day.  And then ultimately, we would stuff ourselves silly on holiday.  The next thing we knew, we would be all a-twitter about buying Christmas gifts, finding and decorating just the perfect Christmas tree, hanging up decorations, baking Christmas goodies, and getting ready at church for the Christmas pageant.

O Lord my God, I will give thanks to you forever!   –  Psalm 30.12b

I read this recently from a Ravi Zacharias writing – that for the Greeks, it was knowledge.  For the Romans, it was glory.  But for the Hebrews, it was light.  He used several verses including, “The people that sat in darkness have seen a great light.”  (Matthew 4:16), “There was the true light which coming into the world, enlightens every man.”  (John 1:9), and “For God Who said, ‘Light shall shine out of darkness’, is the One Who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.”  (II Corinthians 4:6)