DEEP WATERS

I've been thinking about one word a lot recently... LEGACY. My thoughts can be traced to a recent event in my life. This past week I spent time in my hometown of Baltimore, Maryland. I traveled home for my Uncle Alvis's funeral on this past Monday. His funeral was one of the most precious I've ever attended. The room was filled with people whose lives have been touched one way or another by Uncle Alvis. Family members, colleagues, neighbors, fellow church members -- we all crammed into his A.M.E. (African Methodist Episcopal) church home to reminisce and illuminate a life fully lived. My uncle spent his life serving college students as a professor in the School of Social Work at Howard University in Washington D.C. (my alma mater, by the way - HU!!!). As the president of Allen University in Columbia, South Carolina for a short time. As a member of the peace corps in Liberia, West Africa (which my family and I visited when I was only 4 years old). As a social activis...

This week I watched "Dead Poets Society." A lover of quotes, this movie was made for nerds like me. I've been quoting lines from the movie ever since. I offer you one here, delivered by John Keating (played by Robin Williams), an English teacher at a prestigious prep school for boys: "Boys, you must strive to find your own voice. Because the longer you wait to begin, the less likely you are to find it at all. Thoreau said, 'Most men lead lives of quiet desperation.' Don't be resigned to that. Break out!" Do you strive to find your own voice in the world? Have you ever felt that "quiet desperation"? Have you known the urge to "break out" of the mold of your life? I believe there are two facets to this need, this desire, this desperation. 1. We are called to something bigger than ourselves As far back as I can remember, when I was but a little pigtailed girl in Baltimore, Maryland, I've believed that there...