Stauffer Chapel on Pepperdine’s Malibu campus is the location of the beautiful, sacred space in the photo. I visited this chapel many times when I was studying for my bachelors degree there. The stained glass you see depicts the Tree of Life and together with the six additional glass side panels represents the largest collection of stained glass assembled west of the Mississippi at the time the chapel was built (1973).

The stained glass was designed by Robert and Bette Donovan. It took nearly a year to assemble and install the 3,000 square feet of glass. There are no less than 105 glass hues. Throughout the day, with the west facing hillside chapel set as close as you can get to the Pacific Ocean across Pacific Coast Highway, light shifts endlessly in awesome degrees of intensity. This place resonates with me more now than ever as a vortex of solace, safety and a higher vibration.

It is with a humble and grateful heart that I pen this letter of love to you. My year began in an ordinary way, the pandemic notwithstanding. To be honest, I was floundering- searching for something I couldn’t define. And then in the spring I learned I had a cancer in my colon.

At first I was shocked. It was as if that news was being told to someone else but when it finally sunk in I knew I had a choice to make. I could succumb to fear and feel sorry for myself or I could choose to accept the news with the understanding that everything would play out the way it was going to play out. It was an easy choice. Acceptance and appreciation for whatever lay ahead was the only way forward.

The doctor that excised the polyp believed he had gotten it all out of my body so there was that but we couldn’t be sure. The journey that followed led me on a search for the right surgeon, then a major abdominal surgery and several weeks of recovery. The great news is there was no more cancer and the malaise that had been clouding my vision lifted too.

During that time I found my way back to writing and my love for music, which is where my life started even before I sat in the little chapel on the hill in Malibu. I reunited with my cousins in Dallas, Sherman and California and amidst it all I started falling for a wonderful guy.

The jury is still out on the guy. You see I made a painful mistake in judgement that’s no doubt hard for him to understand. It would be funny if this was a movie but it hurts like crazy and I haven’t heard from him since. Still it hasn’t been that long and I do feel there’s mutual interest in taking the next step whatever that turns out to be. If thoughts are things and they influence outcomes as I think they do then here’s to believing the best is yet to come.

So as we join in spirit during this powerful season of love and light, I wish you good health and all the happiness your heart can hold.