The Lord is my shepherd; I lack nothing. I say it so quietly no one can hear, with my useless hands jammed under my thighs. From the exam room in the oral surgeon’s office, I watch as the dental assistant walks my son across the hall for x-rays. Her long hair, shiny with florescent light, […]

The Spirit says, pray, so we do. Happy Friday, friends!

We walk down the tree-lined sidewalk, pilgrims to Knowing, our bodies dappled with sun and dark, blotting leaves, our feet climbing a shadowy canopy. The air is thick with rain that just won’t fall; we glance up at a few steel-colored clouds backlit and rimmed in sunlight. We have logo-printed ponchos they gave us at […]

I joke and call myself a hoop jumper, me with my hair flying wild around my face and my exercise clothes still on from before carpool; me with a pen in one hand, and a mess of papers stretched across the desk in indistinguishable stacks, some paper-clipped, some loose and, as Kevin would say, “flapping […]

Fresh from the shower on an 80-degree day that feels thick with the promise of Summer, Adam spins–literally–into the kitchen wearing flannel pajama pants–buffalo check–and a salt-washed long-sleeved t-shirt as blue as his eyes. I wonder how he doesn’t instantly feel that sticky prickle of after-shower sweat at the base of the neck and the […]

“The way the game works,” Zoe says, sitting across the table and all that history, tossing a deck of playing cards back and forth loosely in her hands, “is that you don’t get to know the rules. You have to figure them out as you play.” She and her friend exchange a glance, and friend […]

We sit, Kevin and I, on metal locker room benches dotted with holes, our bodies carefully sandwiched between a woman in a kerchief–silver-gray hair slipping out at the edges, and a herd of boys climbing over their mother. Mom smiles weakly when we say hello, studying the numbered slip in her fingers while one of […]

Impatiently, I refresh the screen, tapping my foot, jiggling the mouse with my hand. Come on, come on, come on. A few days ago, I sent Riley’s doctor a message on the patient portal, a few questions about upcoming labs and potential patterns. Sometimes parenting a child with epilepsy, especially while adjusting meds, feels like […]

From my bedroom, where I stand folding clothes, pressing my mama hands flat against warm shirts, smoothing out the lines, I can hear Zoe laughing. That laugh of hers, it’s like the wings of a thousand birds flying free. Her door is closed, but I know that when I tap my fingers against it; when […]

When we round the corner, she gets up from where she sits, pushing open the door.  I can see the cold, straight legs of a card table through a narrow opening; I can tell she has hair the color of straw, that she wears a rose-colored shirt.  Even before she stands in the doorway holding […]