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About Barbara
I’m Barbara Falconer Newhall and I’ve got a serious case of the human condition.
I’ve done it all: career, family, house, garden, and a prize-winning book, "Wrestling with God." The result: I'm a woman of years, lots of them, who can't help seeing things from the funny side.
Tucked away on this website are hundreds of riffs on life. I hope you’ll seek them out – and keep me company as I discover the humor, if not the meaning, in what life throws my way. Learn More
THE LATEST
Widowed: Archiving My Husband and Zodiac, His Scrappy 1970s News Service
Can you archive a dead spouse? Can you stash them away in a temperature-controlled academic repository, to be preserved for centuries? Read more.
BARBARA’S BOOK
★ Publishers Weekly, starred review
Any seeker of any faith will be blessed to read the words of this fine author and observer. Read more.
An inveterate doubter for most of her adult life, journalist Barbara Falconer Newhall embarks upon a quest to find a way to believe in God in the twenty-first century.
The result is Wrestling with God: Stories of Doubt and Faith, which details her search for the Divine in the lives of diverse Americans – from a fundamentalist Christian to a progressive Muslim to a Buddhist monk.Seekers of all persuasions will feel represented here, from priests, ministers, and rabbis to engineers, physicists, and avowed non-believers . . . a riverflow of a book. — Phil Cousineau, host of PBS’s Global Spirit
Recent Riffs on Life
Happy Birthday, US of A. You Made It to 250.
Happy birthday, US of A! You made it to 250. A little the worse for wear, but still here. Read more.
Sixteen Years Left to Live. How Many Bowls of Froot Loops Is That?
In the sixteen years I’ve got left, how many of the gotta-do items on my to-do list will I get done? Read more.
DON’T MISS!
It’s August, But It’s Not Too Soon to Wonder — Can Christmas Be Christmas Without the Kids?
Christmas has gotten to be a scheduling nightmare. Peter lives in Minnesota. Christina lives in Southern California. Jon and I live in Northern California. That puts 400 miles between us and our daughter and 2,000 miles between us and our son. Not exactly over the river and through the woods. Read more.
Nature Giveth and Nature Taketh Away
Against all odds, a flowering fruit tree took root in the wild canyon below our house, but not for long. Nature giveth, nature taketh away. Read more.
My Purple Rain Garden: Is the Universe Trying to Tell Me Something?
Lots of rain and lots of purple in our garden this year. Purple nemesia, purple iris, purple pansies. What gives? Is this a Purple Rain message from the spirit world? Read more.