So, that thing you’ve been wondering in the middle of weary, with the rotten, metallic taste of failure threatening on your tongue; that question you bury deep when it feels like you’re carrying life like heavy boulders, and it hurts and you’re losing your grip–that? Well, the answer is yes. Yes. You can, because He […]

We sit at breakfast, light falling easy through the curtains, isolated in a moment that feels slower. She pauses, putting her toast on her plate, chewing on her bottom lip.  “Mom, I’m not sure about the words on some of those Valentines.” I knew we would come back to this conversation.  Last year, when I […]

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 a little girl, I spent hours outside, running wild with the wind.  I lived in a house on the marsh of the Lowcountry, where the coming of rain smelled of pluff mud and rotting marsh grass, and humidity lay thick like a hand on my cheek. I played arm in arm with Summer heat, imagination […]

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 […]

My baby girl is all brand new, a butterfly free from a soul’s cocooning. She felt it, and we did too.  The acknowledgement of it glistened in her eyes as she looked at her dad, and then at me, water dripping from wet fingers. On Sunday morning, we’d been discussing Nehemiah chapter 8 over breakfast—why […]

A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.~ Proverbs 25:11 Let no unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. ~Ephesians 4:29 You know, words don’t really come easily to any of us. But in […]

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me (2 Corinthians 12:9). ~the apostle Paul, self-proclaimed “the worst of sinners” in his first letter to Timothy I really hate it […]

I cannot emphasize enough the importance of a good teacher. ~Temple Grandin Mrs. Nesbitt used to throw gum at me during class, her lips curling up in a wide smile that erupted with laughter that sounded half-crazy.  I was always the third child in my family to sit under my teachers’ tutelage, and Mrs. Nesbitt […]

For me, digging in the dirt is breathing deeply. It is a hundred different things at once, and among them freedom, imagination, fragrance, heat. This time of year, I’d rather be outside than in.  The hours out there run away on the breeze, and it returns bringing me peace and joy and conversations with God.  […]