DenyAsk

Michal and I are in the process of purchasing our first home together.   As I look through various listings that match our budget, my heart is yearning for a place of warmth and romance, a place that my dreams call home. In my imagination, our house is contained on a lush slice of space, where the verdant lawn feeds our sight and the pink blossoms soothe our senses.  This tract is far removed from the chaos of rowdy engines and blaring sirens, on a street with no end and no commercial clutter.  Children are playing outside, free from dread and full of glee.  A soft wind rustles through the linden tree, and a bright sun smiles its approval through the kitchen window.  Everywhere I look, there is a morsel of green to stimulate the soul and purify the air.   This patch  of grass and blossoms is a place of perpetual vacation for our thoughts and an inspiration for our heavenly ascent. As much as I nurture this recess of my dreams,  our prese...

This week my father celebrated sixty years of life under the sun. It is hard to summarize the impact my dad has had upon my life and those closest to him.  He has touched us in so many ways, and has left his imprints upon such vast corridors of our hearts.  My best attempt to detail his influence could only be marginal in scope, for the man that I call Dad is more complex than my impoverished words may shape him to be. I can remember, as a child, my father reciting Romanian poems such as "The Queen of Ostrogots", "Night of May", and "El Zorab".  These sessions of recital unleashed in me a flood of desire for the nobility of words and their power to elevate the threshold of beauty in the human heart.  Listening to his voice, I could feel the anguish of a dispossessed queen, the sorrow of a widowed wife, the flutter of a lover's heart, the weight of age upon one's mind...  My father's voice, at times soft with whisper, at times thunderous with ...