Waking Up the Karma Fairy: Life Lessons and Other Holy Adventures

In this collection of 40 essays, Meg Barnhouse writes about everyday events such as dropping stuff off at the thrift shop or watching TV with the kids--and she transforms them with her offbeat humor and infectious hopefulness. We meet characters like Julia Hill, who set up camp atop an old-growth redwood in order to stop the loggers: "Maybe she's a saint. Maybe she's nuts. I don't have to decide." And Mike, who parks his Chevy Silverado in vacant lots next to a homemade sign. On the day Barnhouse found him, his sign read: "Mom and Dad, are your children saved? The devil is after their souls." "One of my hobbies," Barnhouse says, "is talking to people who aren't going with the flow."

Barnhouse puts her faith in the Karma Fairy, who is "here to show us that we are not safe in our righteousness, our intelligence, our careful nutrition, our common sense, our hip and groovy walk in the Tao. She is here to give us deep, full hearts. She is here to show us that we have it in us to make as big a mess as the next person. If we are ever going to find a cure for self-righteousness, the root of all separation, of all cruelty, we need her touch."

Meg Barnhouse is a columnist for the Spartanburg Herald Journal and has been a commentator on the Carolinas' popular public radio program Radio Free Bubba for thirteen years. A former Presbyterian minister, she is currently minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church in Spartanburg, South Carolina.