Sometimes, I worry my prayers. I squint hard, stumbling over what to say. “I have no words,” I mutter. I take notes, not wanting to forget what I meant to mention. I worry about the public articulation of my need, how I’ll sound. I forget who hears me. Maybe, I misunderstand what He knows already. […]

Fresh morning and the coffee steams; my pen scrolls over a page in my journal. Out on the porch, by flickering candlelight and the dim glow of twinkle lights, I list gifts–morning stillness, early light, sleep-rumpled skin, a bed piled high with quilts—while the birds sing. Those birds, they’re only this loud at dawn. I […]

“What else I can do to help?” Riley asks again for maybe the sixth time, hands on her hips, that grin stretching wide. Riley loves to help. She asks this of my so-beautiful friend, who stands hot-cheeked and fingering a hasty ponytail, assessing an assortment of baskets heaped with supplies, a row of folding tables […]

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 […]

I look down the row all the way to my three babies, now all taller than me–my girls, their legs curving in all the same places as mine, Adam, with shoulders to match Kevin’s. Laser lights stretch across the room like sunbeams. The beat of the music trembles over my cheeks. Even in the darkened […]

Rain dots the windshield. Soft new light scatters over the sticky pollen haze, glistening through the baptismal weather. We pull into the parking lot at school, where kids and teachers already work in community, industriously rolling wheelbarrows and large, wheeled trash cans, plunging shovels and rakes into mountains of mulch. They pause to acknowledge us […]

Just home in the afternoon, her cheeks sun-warm, Riley pauses in front of me. She smells of tree bark and budding flowers, of grass crushed underfoot, even though as far as I know she’s only just walked from the car to the door. She brings the whole world through our front door, and with it […]

I see them in Riley’s closet when I open it to get her shoes, that stack of crowns in every style–gold and silver, jeweled and plain, some with ribbons, some with combs, some with adjustable bands. The stack teeters, a proud tower of hats, trying to blend with the rows of walked-in shoes, the every […]

Adam and I wait, car idling in the driveway, until Riley hurries out, shoes in hand, a pair of socks tucked in like a stowaway. The necklace she plans to wear dangles in the crook of one elbow, and she shivers, because I already brought her jacket out to the car. I admit it, I […]

Early morning, thick dark, and I switch on a lamp, like a lantern burning through a dead fog. Greedily, I sip my coffee, steam curling around my chin, and I wonder how to begin. I feel pulled, yanked even, and this morning, I’m digging in my heels. I really don’t want to do this week. […]