Man Seeks God

Regular blog readers know I love NPR and belong to a book group that just read The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner. Imagine my delight to hear an interview with Weiner yesterday on NPR. You can click to read about or hear it here. Not everybody in my book group enjoyed Weiner's whiny humor, but Man Seeks God sounds like a book I will seek out, being, if not a "gastronomical Jew," at least, like him, a perpetual seeker.

Plus there is the coincidence of seeking out Sufism, which I did accidentally in Arizona on the desert at a Catholic poets' retreat. Haven't I already told you this story? Never mind. Let's just say Weiner and I both like the Sufi poet Rumi. So, sue me.

Woman Seeks Poinsettia

Recently I said to my husband, "I like keeping things alive," which he was happy to hear. I was referring to houseplants and pot plants I'd brought indoors to keep alive over the winter. I've also managed to keep a poinsettia alive since an after-Christmas sale at the grocery store last season. This one was thriving outside during the hot, sometimes wet, sometimes dry summer, and doing OK inside, too, until I re-located it, twice.

First, it was in a spot under the counter getting plenty of sun from the sliding glass patio doors, but getting bumped and broken by people who don't pay attention to poinsettias in pots. So I moved it to the downstairs bathroom, mainly to cover up a hole in the wall (don't ask), but also in hopes of protecting it and giving it the indirect window light that the African violets seem to love.

Poinsettias do not love this same light.

So now it is pale and spindly, but maybe, just maybe, this is the spindliness before the storm of red color?

I fear not.

For red color, tips on poinsettias, and a picture of hers, see Kristin Berkey-Abbott's blog today! And Happy Feast of St. Nicholas Day on this Fat Tuesday in the blog.