The Journey
Welcome to The Journey, a space where Mary McKSchmidt shares her transition from business executive to advocate, photographer, poet, and storyteller. Here, she invites you to walk alongside her as she explores life in the Great Lakes region, its beauty and fragility, and the bonds that connect us all.
Garden of Remembrance
Walking a never-ending ascent to a bluff overlooking the Bandon River outside Kinsale, Ireland, I see a gate painted fire-engine red, adorned with daffodils. On the gate is a plaque framed in gold with bold letters, We Will Never Forget. Stunned, I...
While in Kinsale
A third of the way across the Bandon River bridge,gale winds threaten to hurl me off the sidewalk and onto the path of the oncoming cars. I am loatheto admit defeat, turn back, retrace hard-won steps enroute to the fort, the first one built to defend the harbor. And...
On Holiday
Our decision to remain in the same place for a week or so at a time as we explore Ireland was just what I needed. I do not feel like a tourist, more like one discovering the secrets of a new home. Every journey by foot. Every trip out the red door of this historic...
The Blue Room
Only the bedspread is blue, a bedroom where bay windows are a lens into life inside a forest. It is not the sunny vista discussed every morning she awakened to my presence, but in this room every morning, I feel her presenceand am anything but blue. “Hello, my...
Gaining Strength to Fly
How storm clouds swallowing the horizon seem to dissipatewhen I have no access to anythingbut you and meand this moment. How I wish to retreatinto this cocoon of comfortforever, never again to feel suffering for which I have no...
her death
1. enticing blue skies last lingering leaf conflictedthose final hours 2. heart sliced by painonslaught of torrential rainswimming to the sky our familiar bench bare limbs of locust drenchedground littered with leaves orphan in shadowshalting hoot of the Hornravine...
A Prayer
In the darkness created by those intentionally unravelling the threads of our Constitution, let me see the light that keeps me hopefulgoodness will prevail,that gives me courage to speak and live my own truth,that allows me to see the beauty beyond the darkness.
Of Few Words
Like how he hadn’t wanted to make the four-hour drive to the once-familiar lake nestled in the mountains of northern Arizona— how repeated blows to his spine stillreverberated down his back decades after that last championship football game; like how he struggled to...
I am Mary
born to a published writer who loved life, a communications pioneerwho enhanced relations between public school leaders and voters so that every school millage passed; and to a man, born in poverty, whoearned an MBA in accounting and a PhD in economics to fightfor...
Why He Cooks
He says, “I don’t like to cook,but I do like to eat” and I suspect he remembersthat first Thanksgiving when I plunged the chef knife,a wedding gift, into the side of the unbaked turkey searching for the hole in which to stuff the...
A Gift
I cannot think of a better gift this season than to provide you a link to the 2025 Poetry of Landscapes Holiday Reading facilitated by Jack Ridl and made possible through the technical genius of Julie Ridl.These gifted poets with whom I meet every month make me laugh....
forgiveness
he decided to build a moataround his life, ignoringmy pleas for forgiveness for whatever I did to offend, refusing even a drawbridgefor conversation, choosingto be estrangedforeverand for years I lay awake,my pillow a whipping postfor my imperfect self,knowing I...