181Jul 10, 2015
So, I’ve been hurting over something we do to each other. I say we because I’m guilty too, we because we’re in this together, we because it takes all of us to change our culture. In my life, the repetitive strategy of the enemy often looks like this, just with different supporting details: Flashback nearly twelve years, […]
182Jul 3, 2015
I confess that when she comes to get me, I do not want to get up. I just picked up my book—Dorothea Frank’s Plantation, and I have precious few moments to mind-leap on down to the Lowcountry and shut out the world. Every time this author punctuates a sentence with the word yanh, I smell the […]
183May 29, 2015
I like doing this with you, she says, and I look away from the wild roses just beyond us in the yard, their bold red beauty twisting madly toward the limitless sky, jutting elegantly through the slats. Their freedom completely captures me, that and the way they’ve doubled in size, the way they reach in the […]
184May 1, 2015
He’s in a thousand tiny things: the way one strand of Riley’s hair falls unevenly across her forehead, the rich sound of Zoe’s laughter—and mine—over song lyrics she misinterprets, the faintest hint of flowers on the breeze when I open the back door and walk across the porch. The bird feeders, empty, swing ever so […]
185Mar 20, 2015
For a moment, just breathe. Morning run under bluest skies, and the warmth of the sun splits apart the crisp, cool evidence of a night safely passed. The trees, red and swollen, change the tone of the landscape, pregnant now with possibility. Spring comes suddenly, like a first breath, a startled gasp exhaled as relief; […]
186Mar 13, 2015
This morning, I finally open the box. The lid slides free with a sigh, the satisfying thwump of gift opened, gift held, gift counted. Riley gave me a white hyacinth bulb for Christmas, seed of promise in a rooting vase the color of water. I hold the bulb in my palm, cupping my hand around its teardrop shape, […]
187Mar 6, 2015
Zoe grabs my hand before I turn. “Wait.” We stand on the threshold looking out at the world. Clouds wrap thick, dove-gray over the warmth of the sky, until all sight takes on a stormy cast. Winter lingers, and I want to reach out and touch the knobby buds on the branches of the tree in […]
188Feb 27, 2015
Snow falls, and the gathering white arrests our attention. Somewhere between bacon sizzling and deftly wacking the eggs against the clear bowl with the tiny chip just there, my phone rings. An automated message from the school system. The voice comes through just a little too loud, and I lift my coffee cup (poured steamy the second […]
189Jan 9, 2015
Afternoon, and noting the time, we drop the things in our hands, gathering and folding into the car. We turn corners and lift our hands, flat shields against the blinding sun, mutually complaining about the sight-stealing while we give thanks for the warmth, huddling into our seats. You cannot see my face, for no one […]
190Dec 19, 2014
In the moonlight, her eyes sparkle. She never wears makeup, doesn’t really even prefer it, but she made a concession tonight, for dance. Just now, as we leave the building, a brisk wind lifts a few errant strands of hair away from her ears. The stars rest glittery on her cheeks. I hold the door, […]