I don’t know how we accomplish anything without each other. The day drifts away and we fall into order at the table, stamps and labels and letters in thick stacks in front of us, ropey veins like roots—more pronounced by the passing of years—rising from the backs of our moving hands.  You’d know we belonged […]

They are inside the gas station maybe 5 minutes.  The girls and I wander in while father and son linger at the pump, and then they follow us in, more efficient, by far, than we.  Early morning, and ours is the only vehicle left at at least eight nozzles, though the three dusty spaces beside […]

Travel weary and temporarily keyless, we knock, feeling as dusty as the door, as parched as the plants.  I run my thumb along the delicate thinning edge of a swooping leaf, crisp and browned, like old parchment.  On the door, the vinyl letters have broken in places and begun to curl away, even as they still […]

Arms full of teenaged girls, every afternoon.  I mean, I have their hair in my mouth.  Those long, honeyed strands fly in my face whenever my daughters curl their lithe bodies into me, the one pressing her cheek into my lap, the other settling her ear on my shoulder, reaching for my hand with long, bronzed […]

Twinkle lights cast warm light over their cheeks, their tawny skin, their sun-gold hair.  The summer breeze lifts long, errant strands—mermaid-streaked deep maroon-purple, steel blue.  The girls slide their thumbs over their foreheads, corraling without thinking.  As the day fades along the edges of the dinner hour and the five of us gather on the […]

Today, just a prayer, whispered, then fervid and carpet-muffled because that’s where I plant my nose.  I can’t seem to bend low enough to accommodate the feel of Him.  It’s a prayer I need, one I offer often in some garbled, half-torn way. But He knows all the parts, so I don’t have to remember them, […]

Today, this extravagant Gift: Gently, he traces my cheekbone with the edge of his thumb, just lightly.  It is a simple, wordless gesture, so powerfully warm as to thaw the edges of the day. “I know,” I say, “I have a nasty bump there,” thinking immediately of the blemish on my cheek, red and tender […]

Days after Christmas, and their wishlists still hang on the refrigerator, curling slightly at the corners where our nearness, our brushing past, has gently reshaped the paper.  And of course, the lists have been moved a few times–carefully detached to travel with me to the store, lifted once or twice for closer reading, softly touched with an […]

This is such a crazy time, isn’t it?! In the end, it is something in every way tiny–a broken hairband, actually, popping and snapping against my fingers–that finally breaks my resolve.  It’s always that way with a slow crumble.  Millions of rips–unseen, unheard, unhealed–weaken the muscle until finally the barest graze finishes the work. I stand behind […]

The look on his face is stern as we approach, as though he knows already that there’s something suspiciously wrong about us.  I smile, because I’m pretty sure what he does must be tiring. He must have seen all kinds of things from that perch, watching the hundreds of us file through like worn mules […]