She comes to find me and starts the conversation casually, pulling her hair back with one hand, letting it fall.  The soft blonde strands, deepening now to brown, float out around her face, slide down along the edges of her cheeks.  Her eyes are wells, stronger and more serious at times than her years.  Her […]

Last week, Kevin and I went backpacking on the Appalachian Trail.  I loved it.  And I hated it.  And now, days later, I still want to go back. Identity intrigues me, the way we allow the details of life to shape our perception of possibility; the way I have limited my own view of who […]

As your Christmas cards decorate our mail with friendship, I give thanks.  I walk down the road, swinging my arms, telling God how He’s always provided someone. I read your notes, happy to see the curves of your handwriting, as personal to you as your fingerprints.  I smile when you apologize, thinking your penmanship a […]

The last year I shopped Black Friday, Mom and I sat in a parking lot for two and a half hours, gridlocked, trying to leave.  Our bargains, over which we’d shared exhilarated gloating, sat in their bags, looking less impressive as the minutes passed.  All in all, the madness just didn’t seem worth the money we’d saved. […]

May your unfailing love be my comfort…(Psalm 119:76) Last night, they sat in the chair together, a boy and his dad.  For years, Kevin’s lap has been the place where Adam finds the most comfort.  In his most terrible moments, when he cries so hard he gasps for air, this is the place he remembers […]

Last week, two friends knelt in the dirt beside me, the grass pressing lines into their ankles, and washed my feet. That’s exactly what they did, even if it looked more like twisting shovels into the earth and planting a little hope.  We buried the seeds of allium, hyacinth, tulips, and daffodils, tucking them away for […]

I’m a runaway, convinced to stay by the love of a God who sees me. “Where have you come from and where are you going?” God said her name, mentioned details about her life, and then the question.  Hagar was an Egyptian, a slave, no one He should have sought.  She was an expectant mother used […]

On Sunday, I felt the trembling, electric surge of deep knowledge, my breath catching in my throat as I held Zoe’s hand—too thin, the bones too visible, the skin cold and wrinkling.  I fumbled with Adam’s glucose meter, putting in a strip.  I changed the lancet in the tester so that I could prick her […]

It’s funny how one word can mean such different things. In the afternoons, Adam learns to clean the house, my hand gesturing to a trash can he’s to empty or resting over his own, showing him the right way to hold a can of Scrubbing Bubbles.  Right now, we focus on three jobs—emptying trash cans, […]

I’ve been disowned. The letter came while I vacationed on the coast.  It blew in cold and hard, and the words cut like a knife.  Others have walked away before, but this is my first rejection by association.  I’ve never actually been in conflict with this person, never shot them an angry look, never even […]