tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790Mon, 03 Nov 2025 08:36:23 +0000communitymemoirpoem/dream/conflictthe cabinJesusLutheran Churchchildrencreationdomestic arteducationliteracymedia ecologyseaside sand dunetechnologyworkfrom a Part to the Wholehttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Anne)Blogger97125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-2725363674811531913Wed, 29 Jan 2014 08:44:00 +00002014-01-29T00:57:29.105-08:00Dear Mrs. Becker, I kind of feel like time is running out. When I was in your class all those years ago in elementary school, I promised that if I ever wrote a book, I would dedicate it to you. I'm within striking distance. It might be a few more years, but it's going to happen, and it's going to be the first of a lovely career, and even though there are so many others who have helped and loved http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2014/01/to-superb-langauge-arts-teacher.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-4508304125588868722Fri, 20 May 2011 21:45:00 +00002011-05-20T19:14:30.771-07:00childrencommunitydomestic arteducationJesusLutheran Churchmedia ecologyDear Denomination-Specific Christian Publishing House From Which My Church Body Obtains a Majority of its Materials, I received an email inviting me to participate in an online market research survey about products and services available via the Internet and for smartphones and/or e-readers. I hesitated to take the survey because I know myself as a consumer. I am conservative in many things,http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2011/05/is-it-legitimate-to-wring-ones-hands.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-606997915005572118Thu, 19 May 2011 20:57:00 +00002011-05-19T14:01:32.998-07:00Dear Beth Rockney, I'm trying to remember the particulars of how we met and became friends, because I think these two events were separated by at least a year during which we did not see each other at all. At an age when I did not yet appreciate a writing friend, I signed up for a writing activity during summer camp. To the best of my memory, the counselor in charge of this enterprise told us http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2011/05/to-lost-pen-pal.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-3064103222085516122Tue, 17 May 2011 20:38:00 +00002011-05-17T14:20:34.738-07:00To the Family of Frederick R. Suriman (May He Rest in Peace),A few weeks ago I learned of Fred's death. I am very sorry for your loss. I never knew Fred and he never knew me. However, I was a little surprised to find nothing of my husband and children in his obituary, and I was quite surprised to see no record of my mother-in-law, and her mother. Had Fred made different choices, we would have http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2011/05/to-family-of-frederick-r.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-6946955224166122205Mon, 16 May 2011 21:15:00 +00002011-05-16T15:15:11.148-07:00Dear Molly Erwin,I thought of you yesterday when I was looking in my rearview mirror to put on lipstick, because I noticed that there was a little bit of lipstick that had found it's way onto a tooth, requiring the delicate business of reaching in past the painted lips and removing it. I had to make a funny sort of buck-toothed bunny face. "This wouldn't have happened," I thought, "if I'd done http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2011/05/to-highschool-hero.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-3978619402811762274Tue, 19 Oct 2010 20:14:00 +00002010-10-19T14:28:27.641-07:00memoirthe cabinworkA trip to the cabin required an accounting of many things. I was a child, though, and all I had to think about was to bring the clothes that I didn't mind getting dirty. I'd brought the ones that couldn't get dirty before because I was a little girl. Then, in the forest, some bacchanalian impulse would always whisper to me, and the clothes would never be the same when we came home, even after thehttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/10/woodcutter.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-4002585740407017334Mon, 13 Sep 2010 19:36:00 +00002010-09-13T13:09:57.361-07:00Day 281Dear Diary,Sometimes the walls in here change a little. Everything gets hard and tense. It's been happening for awhile. But lately, at those times, I like to push my head down into the small space just below me. It's snug and close and my head just fits. When it happens again and again, the big movements stop. My whole vessel becomes very still.This happened last week, again and again. At http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/09/cramped-quarters.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-577197914101066687Thu, 09 Sep 2010 20:19:00 +00002010-09-10T19:14:20.811-07:00seaside sand duneI'm not sure who or what Tibet is, but I always see that "Free Tibet" bumper sticker, especially when me and my friends go riding in Big Sur.I wonder if people are doing it? Freeing Tibet? I wonder if the bumper sticker makes a difference to Tibet. Does Tibet know that people in America are putting it on their cars? Can the people who read the bumper stickers free Tibet? Can the people who put onhttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/09/free-jr.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-7722988541722495381Tue, 07 Sep 2010 20:43:00 +00002010-09-07T21:43:19.795-07:00creationmemoirthe cabinThe ants at the cabin were enormous. They were, in memory, at least an inch long. They assembled their hills out of little granite pieces the size of grape-nuts, and the good hills stretched a few yards. There was a hill on the side of the road, just below where our drive met it, and it stretched all the way to the bend in the road. If you were about on foot, you knew you were almost home when http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/09/cabin-in-woods.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-8733672229128097003Fri, 03 Sep 2010 19:12:00 +00002010-09-03T18:52:40.710-07:00communityliteracytechnologyWhen you read a good ways into a book, a real book printed on paper and bound, you can squeeze together the pages you've read to measure how far you've come. You can see how close to the middle or the end you are by the thickness of the pages. Then, once you finish the book, you can put it on your shelf next to your other finished books. Look at all the pages you've read!When you give a book as ahttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/09/on-merits-of-books-or-book-is-not.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-5254062395056640693Sun, 22 Aug 2010 21:31:00 +00002010-08-22T15:10:13.801-07:00poem/dream/conflictThe pastor sat in his chair and swiveled around to a bookshelf. "Would you like a cup of tea?" He picked up a mug. "I have mint, Earl Grey and green.""Oh! ...yes, please." She realized that she was still standing. She sat down and sighed. "Pastor," she said. "I think I can teach Sunday School."She received the cup of water and three tea envelopes from the pastor. He sat back down and faced http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/08/pastor-sat-in-his-chair-and-swiveled.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-4216842107213281583Thu, 19 Aug 2010 00:29:00 +00002010-08-18T17:37:53.765-07:00poem/dream/conflictFor him we batter our hands/ who won for once over the world’s weight.She’d read the whole poem, stuck it out for once. It wasn’t a good time to read a whole poem. She was standing, bag on shoulder, waiting for the pastor in his study. Wasn’t sure why her anxiety moved her to a book of poems; that’s not where she’d normally find solace. And if the pastor should appear, she’d have felt like an http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2010/08/poemdreamconflict.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-7197758396100520674Tue, 23 Jun 2009 17:10:00 +00002009-06-23T10:30:20.283-07:00The back screen door growls open and creaks shut. Nick, a vision in denim and navy and gold rugby stripe, stands on the stoop. His eyes are generously spaced and sweet and his shoes are still untied.“Our trenches have puddles in them,” I tell him. He looks. “Yeah.”“Yesterday the whole back yard was perfect for playing. The dirt was just wet enough for digging and the sun was shining. All thehttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/2009/06/current-project.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-1113502917797275729Sat, 07 Feb 2009 23:34:00 +00002009-05-01T13:38:36.551-07:00If by "somewhere" you mean "something I can read on Anne's blog".Some wise man once said a blog is a little seed. It may lie dormant for many years, but its sleep, nestled in the nutrients of the earth, may in time send up a probing white neck, noodling back to the sunshine.Okay, no wise man ever said that. What kind of a wise man uses "noodle" as a verb? But this blog has noodled its way backhttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/2009/02/flattery-will-get-you-somewhere.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-115474110086189085Sat, 05 Aug 2006 00:39:00 +00002006-08-04T18:25:00.936-07:00Hey, whaddya know, I have a blog. I finally got that plane ticket home from Taiwan, too. Only I had so much luggage, and the bus that was supposed to take 90 minutes to get to the airport, it turned out, now takes 180 minutes, that Yule decided I would cry trying to take the train. So he and YiWen drove me themselves. After that, debacle, there's not much of a travel story to tell, because http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/08/just-blip.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-115085306337789674Wed, 21 Jun 2006 00:27:00 +00002006-06-21T04:25:19.356-07:00They say garlic helps lower blood pressure and cholesterol, helps insomniacs to sleep and repels mosquitos and unwanted creeps at bars. Or everybody, really. But you might not have known garlic as a bringer of the heavenly kingdom.Wednesday nights bring an opportunity to pick up a little Chinese in a semi-organized fashion. For the past semester, my usual teacher is a friend of our hosts Yule http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/garlic-and-its-usefulness.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-115069741875515931Mon, 19 Jun 2006 06:10:00 +00002006-06-19T03:52:05.110-07:00Much like a recent college grad, I've found myself faced with a simliar set of questions these days. I have a hunch many readers want to know the same things. Casual conversations elicit shorter responses, or as much as I can get in edgewise, but I here you can read unabridged explanations. Conversational questions tend to be a little more blunt, as you will see. That's just part of the http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/frequently-asked-questions.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114992515570429050Sat, 10 Jun 2006 07:29:00 +00002006-06-10T00:50:58.820-07:00Concordia Middle School, where the Practice Hotel is (and where I live) sits on a bit of a hill. After all this rain, I began to wonder where it was all going, so today I put on river shoes and a raincoat and walked to the bottom of the hill. Sure enough, the canal there was running high and muddy, and the bent weeds along the banks showed that it had run up to 1.5 meters higher than I beheld http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/still-raining.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114986756595690804Fri, 09 Jun 2006 13:16:00 +00002006-06-10T00:49:18.026-07:00A couple of weeks ago I went to Tainan.An acquaintance from Friday Night Bible Study and I were talking. She asked how long I'd be in Taiwan yet. When she learned that I'd be gone for the foreseeable (sp?) future after a month and a half, she insisted that I visit Tainan before I leave. We marked our calendars.Sometimes I have introverted tendencies, like doubling back on plans for dumb http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/tainan.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114985151018231872Fri, 09 Jun 2006 10:45:00 +00002006-06-09T09:18:02.120-07:00Last night booming thunder woke up most folks at the Practice Hotel, sounding as if the clap materialized from inside the building."It was the loudest thunder I have ever heard," stated resident and foreign teacher Anna Horkey.Since that time a massive low pressure system with arms all over Asia has dumped almost a foot of rain on ChiaYi, Taiwan."My alarm went off at 7:30 this morning, when I http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/now-where-did-i-put-that-ark.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114969235863892050Wed, 07 Jun 2006 13:04:00 +00002006-06-09T05:57:07.686-07:00Well, I think I've waited long enough since the last post to throw off any would-be readers. So it's time to have a little fun. A scad of mini-posts! What could be cuter?Now The Past is a pretty broad topic, so, like we learned in school, we have to pare it down a little bit. I'm going to reflect specifically on how my understanding of Taiwanese life has shifted.When I first came to Taiwan, Ihttp://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/past.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114968545854072633Wed, 07 Jun 2006 12:37:00 +00002006-06-09T05:56:06.323-07:00It's my last month of service here in Taiwan. My record of the year here has been limited, at least as far as the blog is concerned. At the outset I had designs for video and audioposts and whatnot. Well you know what they say: ask for the moon and get New Jersey. Let's tackle some tough topics. The futureAfter squaring away some paperwork, grading, and other insipid tasks, all that remains http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/06/pending.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114611537742918596Thu, 27 Apr 2006 05:03:00 +00002006-04-28T23:40:48.756-07:00Any kindergarten teacher in the world know's one has to be ready for curveballs. They also know said curveballs make for some pretty good stories. Curveball of the week: we suddenly learn Monday morning that each class had been given over to wholly inept college students who've invaded the kindergarten en masse in order to participate in some type of field experience. It's enough to http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/04/lemme-tell-you-about-my-day.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114588100549767697Mon, 24 Apr 2006 12:16:00 +00002006-04-24T17:59:50.140-07:00I have a preferred class of kindergartners. Inexplicably, they are called "Hyacinth". I hesitate to say "favorite", even though it might be true, because it reflects poorly on me as a professional. Plus, my other classes are filled with equally enchanting little muffins, but one teacher makes the difference. The Hyacinth class has the best homeroom teacher, and as a result, they are more http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/04/perfect-little-muffins.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12766790.post-114572311593236102Sat, 22 Apr 2006 16:25:00 +00002006-04-22T09:25:16.110-07:00Believe the headlines! The rumors are true; there's a divine call from Mecca, er, St. Louis MO with my name on it. Grace Chapel Lutheran School offers me their third grade position. The papers are on their way. It's my understanding that they're spending some time at the district office. Last night at Friday Night Bible Study, I was talking to another expat. Previously unchurched, she has http://openepistle.blogspot.com/2006/04/calls-pending.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Anne)