“Good government…what is that, anyway?” Kevin says this as we unwrap for the day, as he laces his shoes, puts his keys in his pocket.  He saw the sign while running, his breath coming hard, the knit cap on his head a dot bobbing down Fall streets, his thoughts lost in the loud chatter of […]

The day Fear lays my friend flat, pressing her back, her head on the hood of my car, the day her tears dot the pavement at our feet, Adam is the only one who knows what to do. And it has nothing whatsoever to do with what he lacks. Adam and I have a routine […]

It makes perfect sense to me that God brought me here, beside a clear, turquoise sea that shines like burnished silver, iridescent in the day’s dying light, to remind me to be available to Him.  Every day, He asks me to be available, waiting, watching, surrendered.  The doing remains His, the surrendering entirely mine. God gave us […]

Adam had been talking about this trip for a week–father and son, side-by-side in a pick-up truck, on their way to the beach. To say that Adam has been talking about anything just makes me smile, because nothing sounds as sweet as his voice, nor does anything touch us quite like his earnest efforts to […]

“This way that we love, that’s how it should be loving God,” He says this morning, eating breakfast beside me.  “The way that we communicate, the way you know how I’ll feel about something, how you hear my voice in your head, that’s exactly how it’s supposed to be with Him.” He folds his napkin, […]

Something about the way he broke that day reminded me that living is cross-shaped. “Adam has been crying for the last few hours,” she says to me, the aide instead of the teacher, walking carefully to my window as I park the car. “The last few hours?” Oh, how the living hurts, how it drives […]

She sits, curled on my bed, the polish on her toes slightly chipped, and she reads, absently pushing an errant blonde wisp back from her forehead. I am struck by her beauty, the beauty of having her near. The reading has absorbed her, first her Bible, then the devotional book we gave her for her […]

Sometimes the thief comes early, sliding into our sleep, wrapping his black fingers tight around our throats.  He reeks of murderous jealousy, the kind that killed Abel, the kind that taints every breath and sits heavy on the heart. Zoe stands in front of the dry erase board, not yet fully awake, her hair a […]

Clouds the deepest gray, hovering close, and I gather myself into the van to retrieve my children, preparing for the storm.  It will rain soon, and hard.  I can smell it. And I never have enough for this part of the day. Honestly, I laugh and sometimes cry whenever I hear that someone thinks I […]

The waiting settles in—somewhere deep in my bones—laying a heavy hand against my eyes, clouding everything like the veil of early morning fog blanketing the horizon, obscuring the sharp lines of roof tops, cloaking the striving limbs of the trees. Two and a half hours at the doctor’s office, and I come home to dirty […]