This morning a verse that I’ll carry all day, like a go bag or, a staff that bears my weight and steadies my feet: Continue steadfastly in prayer, staying awake in it with thanksgiving. I sat on my parents’ back porch for a while just receiving provisions, grace, from God, sipping coffee while the day […]

This afternoon, I walk down vibrant streets amid trees of every shape and size, their saturated leaves upturned to receive, awaiting the coming of nourishing rains.  Sweat meanders down my spine, the humidity thick and heavy with promises.  It will rain today, in heavy sheets, but in the meantime, the landscape waits, dense with anticipation. […]

My friend steps in the house quietly, glancing toward the desk where Riley sits taking an online college course, slipping her arms around me to pull me into a hug. “It’s good to see you,” I say softly over her shoulder, thinking that there’s nothing quite like feeling your arms full of friendship. She draws […]

We gather as family around the table to celebrate Josh’s birthday—Camille and Ray and Kevin and me with our kids, all following the hostess in the Japanese restaurant like ducks in a line, and I count the blessing.  In my heart, every meal is a eucharist. And when He had taken some bread and given thanks, He broke it […]

We breeze in the back door like windblown leaves turning at the edges, all of us rushing in on the holiday gust. “I’m related to all these people, but I don’t know them,” Zoe said with some awe, us tumbling out of the car and crunching our way through the parking lot, weaving around this […]

“I can’t–” “Here, I’ll help you,” she says, my Riley, who once said nothing. The kids at our table–this table, finished with glitter and glue and flecks of marker and fingernail polish, finished with a whole history of growing and laughing and living—these kids flat press their little hands on construction paper, tracing, jagged-cutting the […]

I remember the year that opening gifts made my daughter weep. She stood in front of me, just there, tight blond curls falling haphazardly around her ears, belly pudging out the shirt of her Christmas pajamas, holding a silvery gift.  At 3, she still didn’t understand our expectant faces, or even what made toys fun, […]

Thanksgiving leaves scatter across our table, as though the Wind has carried them in a flying whirl through the windows, twisting them across the grass and through the air to land where we gather to give thanks.  Adam walks to the table, turning first to reach for a pencil.  I feel what he is about to […]

Dinner time–almost, and already the crisp darkness makes our window panes cold beneath my fingers.  I switch on lamps to fill the room with light, light I hope will glow well beyond the house, slipping out around the edges of the panels of the curtains, beaming boldly through the glass.  And with the light, I pray […]

We will travel a long way to be with family. Dark as pitch in the pouring rain, lights reflecting on the wet road, and our kids settle in with pillows and blankets—two wide-eyed; one quickly asleep again.  I grip a tumbler full of coffee–black and murky like the night sky–in my chilled hands, preparing myself […]