It’s evening here, where our feet beat a path down a dizzying urban road that smells like sunbaked asphalt and motor oil and sweat, like jasmine perfume and donuts and bitter coffee, where stars blink on the buildings as well as in the sky, lighting the night an inky crimson black.  The intersections pulse with […]

Down the stairs Riley comes, hair dangling in dark, wet, cheek-sticking ropes that send water wandering her neck in drops.  Fresh from the shower and wearing her donut-printed pajamas, she keeps a quicker pace than usual, purpose the wind beneath her feet.  She takes the stairs one foot at a time, instead of at a […]

On Saturday morning, we gather, rumpled and meandering, around the brunch table, where steam curls lazily over mugs of coffee and the fruit of God heaps in bowls, vibrant and kind, at the center.  We wear our pajamas and our morning hair, the lines on our faces from our pillows.  We savor our food and […]

I wash Adam’s feet almost every day, soaking the diabetic’s precious, never-ending walk, his steady, vulnerable progress, in tender keeping, using a home remedy I found online, a mixture designed to slough off dead skin and soften calluses.  You wouldn’t believe it maybe, but mouthwash features in the short list of ingredients, and so, the […]

Adam’s delight. This my friend—my sister—texts after looking at the pictures from our trip, just those two words and a series of hearts, having arrived in seconds at the treasure I will carry with me long after even our memories of summer have faded.  Adam’s delight, that wild smile stretching wide across his lean face, […]

I had asked God to help me see the people around me, even at the theme parks, even as we thrilled through the rides and managed the crowds, even waiting in lines and eating carnival-style food on the fly, even sweaty and wet and foot-sore at the end of the day, that I might have […]

I looked pretty bad, on paper, that’s my thought, tears clinging to the bottom edge of my jaw like dew drops on a limb, Adam’s chilly fingers reaching for my ear, saying, love love love, asking tentatively, in his silent, tender way, if I’m okay. But listen, I’m actually better than okay today. I glance […]

Gospel, Adam says solidly, from the passenger seat beside me, just the one intelligible word gliding in on a stream of sound from his throat.  He does this sometimes when he really wants to say something, as if he needs to throw the word into some sort of sonic white-water rush, just to move it […]

Lift me up The music erupts, like a cry, swelling suddenly in the dark. As if before I had no idea I had fallen asleep, I inhale on the crescendo, watching, watching the stage, feeling how the Breath—the ruach, expands and lifts me. In one way or another, we’re all looking for a good raising, […]

In the late afternoon on Maundy Thursday, I crash, feeling my own slow crumble as I curl into a corner of the couch and tentatively flex, cataloguing the cramps in my feet.  Sometimes, as I consider the years stretching on and no end in sight to the needs in front of me, I feel a […]