I walk in the room and see Love: Tears leave slow trails on her cheeks and he leans over her, catching the drops with one finger.  He slides his finger along her cheek bones, drawing wet crosses over the smooth, tender skin as she cries. She weeps quietly, the way she used to live.  “I’ll […]

Motherhood is an emptying. And the pouring out, with all it’s awkward splats and splashes, really starts the day God drops the seed of a child, planting a soul in our most cavernous places, claiming the soil of us for His own harvest.  The latching on of new life breaks walls, bruises tissue, draws blood. […]

Over lunch, we talk of how we first imagined ourselves as mothers, smiling down at our fingers. I’ve always longed to be the Proverbs 31 woman.  She is clothed with strength and dignity, Word says.  She can laugh at the days to come.  I don’t know, but somehow the unmanicured edges of my fingernails seem […]

In the afternoons, his daughters run to him. They hear his keys jingle in the lock, and nothing matters except that he’s home.  Words hang in the air between us.  Pencils roll off the table where they’ve been carelessly tossed down.  I lift my hands out of the dishwater and dry them on a towel. […]

“What about innocent children with cancer?  Where is god then.” There it is, questioning bold, just below this image: It’s a question for which there are no easy answers, one even believers ask when innocents suffer. Where is the throne of God, the Almighty King, loving, faithful, when this world doesn’t look much like a […]

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 […]

“This way that we love, that’s how it should be loving God,” He says this morning, eating breakfast beside me.  “The way that we communicate, the way you know how I’ll feel about something, how you hear my voice in your head, that’s exactly how it’s supposed to be with Him.” He folds his napkin, […]

Sometimes the thief comes early, sliding into our sleep, wrapping his black fingers tight around our throats.  He reeks of murderous jealousy, the kind that killed Abel, the kind that taints every breath and sits heavy on the heart. Zoe stands in front of the dry erase board, not yet fully awake, her hair a […]

High tide, and the waves curl deep, pounding the sand into a cliff at the break line. I sit watching one shore break after another, absorbing powerful beauty, the explosion of white caps, hard and close. I would love these waves if they broke a little further out and I could ride them in fast […]

We are not an easy family to love. I mean, even for us the loving isn’t always easy.  We are difficult, tired, a ball of chaos with accessories.  Everywhere we go, there are tote bags filled with an eccentric conglomeration of things—our accoutrements, I call them: stuffed monkeys and calculators; dry erase markers, insulin pens, […]