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The Color of Together
"We lose our vocabulary for gratitude when fear becomes our common vernacular. We lose the words that matter most, and, as a result, we lose part of our humanity." -From The Color of Together
Milton Brasher-Cunningham has written a book that speaks to one of the greatest challenges facing us How do we live together when so much seems bent on driving us apart?
"The chance we have to find strains of grace and hope and love—even gratitude," Milton writes, "comes in solidarity and the sharing of our stories, not in the measuring of them one against the other."
When his father died, Milton learned that grief was a primary color of life. That truth is as old as the human story but was new to him.
The Color of Together explores the metaphor more fully, looking at the primary colors of life, which he names as grief, grace, and gratitude, and then expanding the palette to describe some of the other hues that make us human.
"Where grace matters most is in the daily details, the quotidian encounters where we have a chance to step into the contagion that ripples through the grief of our lives, where we pass grace hand to hand to make meaning together," Milton writes.
The book is a conversation between Milton’s personal stories, authors who have been mentors from the page, biblical accounts, and a variety of metaphors that allow us to see the colors of life in different lights and contexts.
This is a story that started in grief and continues in hope.
Milton Brasher-Cunningham has written a book that speaks to one of the greatest challenges facing us How do we live together when so much seems bent on driving us apart?
"The chance we have to find strains of grace and hope and love—even gratitude," Milton writes, "comes in solidarity and the sharing of our stories, not in the measuring of them one against the other."
When his father died, Milton learned that grief was a primary color of life. That truth is as old as the human story but was new to him.
The Color of Together explores the metaphor more fully, looking at the primary colors of life, which he names as grief, grace, and gratitude, and then expanding the palette to describe some of the other hues that make us human.
"Where grace matters most is in the daily details, the quotidian encounters where we have a chance to step into the contagion that ripples through the grief of our lives, where we pass grace hand to hand to make meaning together," Milton writes.
The book is a conversation between Milton’s personal stories, authors who have been mentors from the page, biblical accounts, and a variety of metaphors that allow us to see the colors of life in different lights and contexts.
This is a story that started in grief and continues in hope.
164 pages, Paperback
Published October 13, 2020
3 people want to read
About the author
Milton Brasher-Cunningham
4 books19 followersMilton Brasher-Cuningham is a writer, chef, teacher, minister, musician, husband, and keeper of Schnauzers who lives with his wife, Ginger, in Guilford, Connecticut. He works in New York City. He blogs at www.donteatalone.com, sharing both reflections and recipes.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 17, 2020
When I first learned that my friend Milton Brasher-Cunningham would publish his third book this month, and that the title would be The Color of Together , I had hopes that it would be an October surprise like no other. I was not disappointed.
I could be forgiven for thinking that an election might even turn on this book, particularly given the promise of inclusion. Now that I have been given the privilege of reading the book prior to today’s virtual launch, I am happy to say that, not surprisingly, Milton has transcended politics, and hearts will turn.
When I received my digital copy and began to read this book, I started to make notes for this review. Back in the day, when I was a school teacher, I taught students to read for “connections” – text to self, text to text, text to world. My intent with this book was to catalog my connections, but soon I was spending more time with the connections than with the text at hand. I decided to resist note-taking.
Pre-publication blurbs had advised that Milton would share his own connections, but not just personal ones. While I knew Milton in college as an apparent extrovert, I was less familiar with his mental space, except for his wonderful blog, “Don’t Eat Alone”, which has touched me regularly over time. I was also less familiar with his own self to text connections, which are numerous in this book.
The sub-title of the book, “Mixed Metaphors of Connectedness”, prepared me for this encounter. At Baylor, my English teachers tried to rehabilitate my sports-writing background; “mixed metaphors” were among my frequent sins. Milton, on the other hand, has gifted me with the freedom to explore. He weaves together personal experience, his own past writing, cherished relationships, and self-to-text connections in heart-warming prose.
When I texted my daughter about posting this today, she asked what kind of book it was. I replied “devotional” but she would have to read my review to know what I meant. Given twenty-four hours to think about it, my text to text connection is with Merton; Milton has whetted my appetite anew for a contemplative life.
I could take the reader through the contents of this book but it is better to recommend them. The blurbs highlight grief, grace, and gratitude. I especially like how Milton explores the idea of loss, and I feel his connection to one who was “a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief.”
But this book is not a downer, and it’s not political. It is a text that will be read and re-read.
I could be forgiven for thinking that an election might even turn on this book, particularly given the promise of inclusion. Now that I have been given the privilege of reading the book prior to today’s virtual launch, I am happy to say that, not surprisingly, Milton has transcended politics, and hearts will turn.
When I received my digital copy and began to read this book, I started to make notes for this review. Back in the day, when I was a school teacher, I taught students to read for “connections” – text to self, text to text, text to world. My intent with this book was to catalog my connections, but soon I was spending more time with the connections than with the text at hand. I decided to resist note-taking.
Pre-publication blurbs had advised that Milton would share his own connections, but not just personal ones. While I knew Milton in college as an apparent extrovert, I was less familiar with his mental space, except for his wonderful blog, “Don’t Eat Alone”, which has touched me regularly over time. I was also less familiar with his own self to text connections, which are numerous in this book.
The sub-title of the book, “Mixed Metaphors of Connectedness”, prepared me for this encounter. At Baylor, my English teachers tried to rehabilitate my sports-writing background; “mixed metaphors” were among my frequent sins. Milton, on the other hand, has gifted me with the freedom to explore. He weaves together personal experience, his own past writing, cherished relationships, and self-to-text connections in heart-warming prose.
When I texted my daughter about posting this today, she asked what kind of book it was. I replied “devotional” but she would have to read my review to know what I meant. Given twenty-four hours to think about it, my text to text connection is with Merton; Milton has whetted my appetite anew for a contemplative life.
I could take the reader through the contents of this book but it is better to recommend them. The blurbs highlight grief, grace, and gratitude. I especially like how Milton explores the idea of loss, and I feel his connection to one who was “a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief.”
But this book is not a downer, and it’s not political. It is a text that will be read and re-read.
October 13, 2020
Metaphors are like a magical pair of glasses that give the reader the special power to hear, ponder, try on and live into observations and discovery. From within his life experiences, author Milton Brasher-Cunningham listens for, imagines, reimagines, and gathers words, colors, music, metaphors, and threads of connection to gift us with seeds of possibility. Milton’s book offers a thoughtful, hope-filled invitation to consider, write, revise, and write anew one’s own personal story as an unfolding journey with the capacity to leave a mark:
“Alongside colors and music stands the metaphor of reworking the punctuation of our lives to tell our stories in a new way. Revise, at its root, means to see again. Then we rewrite: we inscribe it again.”
“We have things that give us pause, that take us aback, that deserve greater attention, that require more time. We have marks to leave for all of those things.”
—from The Color of Together
By Milton-Brasher Cunningham
“Alongside colors and music stands the metaphor of reworking the punctuation of our lives to tell our stories in a new way. Revise, at its root, means to see again. Then we rewrite: we inscribe it again.”
“We have things that give us pause, that take us aback, that deserve greater attention, that require more time. We have marks to leave for all of those things.”
—from The Color of Together
By Milton-Brasher Cunningham
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews