Cleaning out my mother’s home, I found this letter I’d written to her the Christmas before she died. Dear Mama, I’ve been cleaning up the Christmas tree this week, sweeping pine needles and thinking of the things I’ve never said to you. They are the things no one says to me that I would so… Continue reading Deep Like a Tap Root
“Think, think, think...” (Pooh says, tapping his forehead.) What’s as good for Bears of No Brain at All as it is for Bears Who Fear Their Brain Is Going--or Gone? Using words, thinking, communicating. It's the last day of June, and I haven't posted anything yet. My goal is to write monthly, but I haven't… Continue reading Bears of No Brain at All
I was dragging my feet getting ready. For as long as I can remember, we've had an open mike for folks to share their thank-yous the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Children often go first and warm up the crowd with sweeping praises, "Thank you, God, for the whole wide world," and with smaller ones, "We have… Continue reading Open Mike
The sun was blinding me through the library windows. We've had rain, rain, and more rain for weeks on end, so the sunshine was a big deal this morning and was more than welcomed. It was worshiped. It felt like a long awaited vacation, like springtime and flowers, like a throwback to "normal life" at… Continue reading Wildflower
Ransom Bruce Harris was born to doula-daughter, Sadie, and her hubby, Bryan on February 7. Sadie made sure to do all the training she’d been coaching her mamas to do over the years and was in wonderful shape for an easy delivery. Only there were other plans in place. After a nearly 30-hour labor and… Continue reading Writhing
He walks to the door, As if he's just going out with friends. "Remember, mom, when I couldn't reach this lock?" His memory connects with mine. "Yes, I do," I say. The lock clicks, The door opens, He steps through. It's just an ordinary day. A little rain. Cloudy. "I love you, mom." "I love… Continue reading Limping Praise
Babies and children used to wake me in the middle of the night, and after that, teenagers coming in late, but now getting up for the bathroom does. Once I'm awake, it's hard to get back to sleep. And then there are the unexplained wake up calls, the ones that wake me from sound sleep… Continue reading The Eye
Time stops in the dark. Before dawn, it yawns and stretches. Putters. Lingers. Moseys. Puts on coffee. And sits. Waits. Makes room. I remember endless time before clocks and counting, when the first day of school and the last stretched out like Highway 16, Macon to Savannah. Nowyearscram instead of c r a w l… Continue reading Dark Thirty
The nest is empty. Our last fledgling is settled into college dorm life and has already slept through his first test, while his mama-bird, blissfully unaware, awoke to her to-do-or-not-to-do list, none of it involving him. I've been preparing Stone his whole life--and myself all year--for when he would be washing his own socks and… Continue reading The Purge
I ordered my dream bed from a shop on Etsy, a carved and distressed French Victorian fit for a king and queen--or wannabes. I ordered it in late February and received it sixteen weeks later, a sign that unless the New Jersey shop owners were felling trees and building beds on demand, my bed was… Continue reading The Bed That Wouldn’t Fit
If Mama were still alive this Mother's Day, I'd have a hard time finding the card I'd most want to send her. I would have to make my own, and it would say: "Thank you, Mama, that we didn’t discover any skeletons." That's a Mother's Day greeting I'll bet has yet to appear on any… Continue reading Making Arrangements
Mama is dying. I’m sitting in her bedroom next to her hospital bed, the metal rail cold against my leg. The oxygen tube is bothering her and Vicky, her caregiver, is adjusting it as I write. “That better, Martha?” Mama moans. Mama normally reads a page from her devotional every night with Vicky. When I… Continue reading Troubling Ourselves
It's late. Probably most of you are in your beds, cozy and comfortable, sifting through the day's events as you drift off to sleep. That's where I'm heading after I hit send. But before I do, I want to sift through the events that happened here, and tell you about the day I had with… Continue reading Sifting
"Well, if you're not struggling, you're dead!" I overheard someone say this week. It's a fitting segue as I sit down to dash this off from Athens, Georgia where this morning, my soccer player at UGA had her 3rd surgery in as many years. Oh my, how this daughter has struggled. When she went off… Continue reading Brightened and Fed
He had been seeing a little boy’s head floating above the door in the hotel room. And they had flown in an airplane they piloted across the mountain to attend Sadie’s wedding in our backyard. Both of these stories gave us something to chuckle about at the reception. Grammy drives a respectable Buick, and there… Continue reading The Second Chance
One True Love 