Category: Amy’s Blog

Reach Out And Touch Someone

Amy Schisler

I wished my best friend a happy birthday today by phone. Instead of celebrating at Easter with a cake or by going out to dinner one evening this week, as we would typically do, we must wait and celebrate once we can be together. I miss her like crazy and can’t wait to be able to go on one of our dinner dates. And this time, Debbie, I’m treating!2020 Debbie bday

Easter was certainly different this year as my husband, children, and mother-in-law ate dinner with my parents and my brothers and their families via Zoom. We watched Easter Sunday Mass “together” online in the morning and then ate dinner “together” that evening. Instead of baskets full of candy and Dollar Tree trinkets, my girls were greeted that morning with a single chocolate bunny on each of their brunch plates. 

As I think about the celebrations that are being cancelled or postponed this spring, I realize how lucky I am, and I’d like to offer a small piece of advice to everyone. Read more →

Hallelujah Is Our Song

Amy Schisler

I write this just a day before we begin the sacred Triduum–those three days before Easter Sunday when Christ suffered His passion and death. I can’t believe that this will be the first Easter in my entire life that I will not be with my parents and brothers and all of our extended family. Our fifty-some person guest list has been dwindled to just six–Ken and me, our three girls, and Ken’s mother across the street from us.

I’ve been crying a lot this week. I feel a bit lost. I don’t know what I would do without my Bible studies (which we continue online), daily Mass, the encouraging messages I am receiving through various email lists and YouTube channels, and the Zoom party my girlfriends and I had last night.

I miss my mom and dad. I miss hugging and sitting with my friends. I miss going to Mass with an excruciating longing.

But… Read more →

Sheltering With My Blessings

Amy Schisler

2020 WildeOur girls were sent home from college on March 13, so it’s been three weeks since we started social distancing and two days since shelter in place was put into effect in our state. To say that we are living on top of each other is an understatement. To say that there haven’t been arguments and disagreements would be a lie. However, to say that it’s been 24 hours each day of nonstop misery would be grossly inaccurate.

Throughout these past few weeks, we’ve experienced both good and bad, and I’m determined to come out of all of this remembering the good, such as… Read more →

The Gift of Time

Amy Schisler

We are now into the second full week of the stay at home, self-containment policy requested by the federal government. It’s been challenging at times, but there has been a lot of good that has come out of it.

I’m reminded on a daily basis that life doesn’t always go according to one’s plan. Things are consistently changed, rearranged, sidelined, or reimagined. Goals are shifted, and priorities are reconsidered. Life is a giant balancing act, sometimes performed on a tightrope, often without a net. How we maintain our balance, meet the challenges, and adjust our way of life and our attitude can and will make all the difference. This time presents us with the beautiful opportunity to see things in a different way. It is, perhaps, the gift that the world so desperately needs.

For example… Read more →

Making Lemonade

Amy Schisler

“However, take care and be earnestly on your guard
not to forget the things which your own eyes have seen,
nor let them slip from your memory as long as you live,
but teach them to your children and to your children’s children.”
Deuteronomy 4:9 

This passage, taken from this morning’s daily Mass readings, made me think of what a great opportunity we all have during this strange and ever-evolving containment period we find ourselves in.

Lemon-clipart-martI’m not talking about about being on guard, though that certainly applies, but about passing things down to our children. What a wonderful way to take the sour lemons we’ve been handed and press them into a sweet concoction of lemonade, made with family bonding and the sharing of generational history.

I experienced this sharing of generational history recently, and it was eye-opening! You see… Read more →

Be Calm and Carry On?

Amy Schisler

This morning, I watched my go-to morning news program, shaking my head at what I saw and heard. Tony Dokoupil, a reporter I greatly respect and admire, was visibly angry and shut down his interview with Alex Azar, Health and Human Services Secretary, because Azar refused to answer a question exactly the way Dokoupil wanted it answered. Three times, the Secretary was interrupted with the same question as he was trying to give the answer. Before Azar was able to fully finish, Dokoupil abruptly ended the interview. Azar wasn’t avoiding the question. He wasn’t playing politics. He was clearly giving a well-thought-out, systematic answer, but he wasn’t allowed to finish.

And this is where we are, folks. As Captain said in Cool Hand Luke, “What we’ve got here is…a failure to communicate.” Or is there too much communication without really saying anything that matters?

And it’s happening everywhere. 

It’s no wonder everyone is confused about staying in or going out. Nobody knows who to believe or what to think. It’s like we’re all… Read more →

Choosing the Good Life

Amy Schisler

2020 GuatemalaEarlier, I saw a meme online that said, “We are not given a good life or a bad life. We are given a life. It’s up to us to make it good or bad.” What a simple but profound statement. 

We are all born into a certain life. Some are born and then a new life is chosen for them. But for all of us, we don’t have any say in where we come from. Some are born to wealth and others to poverty. Some are born into fame while some obscurity. Some are born free while others are born into captivity of one kind of another. No matter where one starts, there are millions of choices as to where one ends up.

Let me tell you a short story… Read more →