The Pall of the Pristine Snow. 2025

January 12, 2026 joanna seibert

The Pall of the Pristine Snow

Guest Writer
Susan Mayes, Fayetteville, AR, January 10, 2025

If only the pall of the pristine snow could gently cover the ashes created by the turbulent fires in Southern California in early 2025, right after the Rose Bowl.

As I awaken in the Boston Mountains on the Ozark Plateau to the perfectly silent, crisp morning air, I am amazed at the loveliness the snow can bring to our landscape. Millions upon millions of tiny fluffy flakes have created this vast sea of white. The trees look like designer-painted trees, with every branch visible to the eye as the precipitation creates a clinging outline of what we don’t see when the trees are fully dressed with leaves. I wish I could paint the many shades of gray, white, and even a blueness of the scene, but alas, I will have to rely on my memory of this beauty.

Above all, I wish angels could magically lift this mass pall of snow and cover the ash remains of property lost by wildfire. The people of Los Angeles, the “City of Angels,” need our prayers of hope and restoration. Our Mother Earth has been trying to tell us something for many years: we must be awake and follow science and solutions to avoid the tragedies we, the caretakers of God’s creation, cause.

I pine for your loss, neighbors, and pray for the containment of fire and the calming of the winds. My hope is that you will once again relish the multiple shades of blue of the Pacific Ocean, the vastness of the sea, and its restorative waters…Peace be with you.

Susan Mayes

Joanna Joannaseibert.com

Three Wise Men: Epiphany Wisdom

January 11, 2026 joanna seibert

“Three Wise Men.” Epiphany Wisdom

“The three were hermits on an island in the Black Sea, very pious and humble and loving to all men but terribly ignorant. A bishop goes on a steamer to see them and teach them a few prayers, but finds them too old and stupid to learn. At last, he gets—or thinks he has got—one very short and simple prayer into their heads, and leaves the island, feeling rather contemptuous.

Then, when night falls, he sees a bright light advancing swiftly over the sea behind the steamer. The old men have come, walking on the waves, begging him to be patient with their incredible stupidity and to teach them the prayer again.”—Tolstoy.

My husband sent me this story. He tries to read it to me, but is so moved that he cannot speak. Alas, if all of us could be that way when we hear this story. I think of people I have talked with, leading retreats and classes, hoping to share the word of God with them. But instead, I learn more about God by listening to them.

I first learn this truth in recovery meetings, where I hear wisdom from people I would never have listened to before. Wisdom comes from those with no education who can barely speak intelligently. Wisdom comes from men and women who have spent most of their lives in prison. Wisdom comes from those who have lost their children because of their addiction. Wisdom comes from women who have lived on the streets. Wisdom comes from people experiencing homelessness.

I also heard this wisdom at our Food Pantry, where people come each week for just enough food to survive. They tell us how grateful they are and bless us. They tell us how blessed they are. They share what they receive with other families. They teach us how to turn our lives and our wills over to God. They teach us how to live and work in community.

In this season, after Epiphany and into a new year, may we keep our ears and hearts open to hear wisdom in “wise men” and women at all places, in each precious moment, and especially where we once least expected it.

Joanna. https://www.joannaseibert.com/

Recall, Recollection, Reflection

January 10, 2026 joanna seibert

RECALL, RECOLLECTION, REFLECTION

Guest Writer: Ken Fellows

LIFE CYCLE

It's intriguing how memories are stored in our brains, ready to be called up or to arise spontaneously. A recent NYT obituary for psychologist Endel Tulving, 93, described how he elucidated our modern understanding of memories. In his 1972 book The Organization of Memory, he proposed that humans have two forms of memory: one is a "semantic form of knowing,"… the storage of facts like "George Washington was our first President," and skills such as "how to brush your teeth." The second form he termed "episodic memory"…recall of places, events, and experiences–the "taste of a delicious croissant eaten on the Champs-Elysees."

Tulving's work also showed that the human brain records and retrieves the two types of information via separate brain tracts or pathways. This insight is substantiated by modern psychological studies and, recently, by PET imaging. He also thought of episodic memory as a human device for "moving forward"…a mechanism for transporting ourselves to a different time. Author Tim O'Brien, in his book The Things They Carried, calls this "joining of the past to the future":

"Forty-three years old, and the (Vietnam) War occurred half a lifetime ago, and yet my remembering makes it now.

"I should forget. But the remembering is that you don't forget. You take your material where you find it, which is your life, at the intersection of the past and the present. The memory traffic feeds into a rotary loop up in your head, where it circles for a while, then imagination flows in pretty soon, and the traffic merges and shoots off a thousand different streets."

O'Brien's thoughts illustrate why long-term recall can be fallible. Similarly, writer Geoff Dyer has observed: "Everything in my book really happened, but some of the things that happened only happened in my head." These observations on remembering…that "imagination flows in and the traffic merges"… elucidate why our recollections may feel 'true' but are not necessarily 'the truth.'

Aging can be a fierce impediment to accurate recall, something most come to endure, making us sympathetic to the older man's complaint in Ward Just's novel Forgetfulness:

"My memory isn't what it was. The years wash into one another, a watercolor

memory. One fact bleeds into another. Emotions bleed. Forgetfulness is a dream state, and it's an old man's friend."

Ken Fellows

Joanna joannseibert.com https://www.joannaseibert.com/