I am reading My Name is Asher Lev. If you have not read it, you must. It is a story about love and art and God. I am also asking a lot of people that I love when they feel closest to God, because I am curious. I have often found God in unexpected places. My favorite place is on the edge of the ocean. I feel like that's where God lives. I have often felt God's presence sitting or walking on a beach - in the Philippines, in Florida, in Indonesia, in South Carolina, in Mexico and Seattle. Dusk on the water's edge can break my heart wide open and love pours in. Where does this happen for you?

Often in the early mornings, I came out of the house and walked across the dunes to the beach. The dunes were cool then from the night. I wore sandals and shorts and a shirt and had on my tefillin. Those mornings, the beach was my synagogue and the waves and the gulls were audience to my prayers. I stood on the beach and felt wind-blown sprays of ocean on my face, and I prayed. And sometimes the words seemed more appropriate on this beach than to the synagogue on my street. - from My Name is Asher Lev