101Oct 11, 2019
My hands lay open in my lap, palms turned up to receive whatever grace God loves to give, somewhere that should feel like home. I bend my head to rest, empty of expectation. This Sunday, round tables replace the rows. Today, we actually worship together; we actually commune. It feels like wandering into a sprawling […]
102Sep 20, 2019
We sneak out on the porch like wild children, flicking lights off as we go, laughter rushing over our tongues like the crisp night air. We open our fists, letting down the day, making room to feel in our palms what can never be traced with our fingers. I blink up at the inky black […]
103Sep 13, 2019
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 […]
104Aug 23, 2019
Today, I walk early, slipping out the door with the light barely new, thinking maybe I’ll escape the heat. But Summer’s sun burns and throbs like it’s been up for hours, and the air sits thick in my lungs, and before I make it down the front steps, sweat becomes my slippery second skin. Already […]
105Jul 26, 2019
I remember sitting at a too short Formica table, overflowing a child-sized chair, in the play area where a couple of bright, shiny women evaluated my then two-year-old Riley. Riley, distractedly pushing platinum corkscrew curls away from her eyes, lined chunky animals along a busy, primary carpet in a long, snaking line. It looked like […]
106Jul 12, 2019
My foot sits right next to Kevin’s under the table; I can feel the warmth of him. I glance away from my book, watching the rise and fall of his chest, noticing that he has begun to pray. His peaceful eyes shut out the world. Years into my own relationship with God, I finally understand […]
107Jun 28, 2019
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. […]
108Jun 14, 2019
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 […]
109May 10, 2019
I look at the pictures, pictures of my people and me, and I frown. Is my face really that round? I draw my fingers out toward the edges of the screen, attempting–without luck—to magnify the dark ache in my heart. Why did I have to smile so big? In the picture, my eyes look like […]
110Apr 19, 2019
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 […]