cultivating the beautiful ordinary by sharing our tales and our tables
I found them gathered on the back deck. PJ pants, hoodies, and hot cups of coffee in hand, my four daughters were circled up and telling stories to one another. The seventeen years that separates them is starting to feel less difficult to close, especially today as the topic at hand is their bodies. The…
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Our wedding anniversary came and went. Although my husband and I love each other very much, I felt empty, cold, and distant. We are attempting to conquer the dark places in our story, rewrite the narrative, and break out of past bondage; however, on our anniversary, I longed to barricade myself away from feeling or thinking.…
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Like the air, dreams are thick. “Where do they come from?” Slowly moving through stories. Stories electrify my body and paralyze me, strung together much like an addict strings up a row of sober days and calls it enough. These are my sober days. I feel the buzz in my head grow louder, the words…
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It’s a blurry line really, A delicate balancing act: Holding you, holding me. I’ve ignored you And denied you. Pretended you were someone else.
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I sat at a restaurant bar with him last night. It had been almost three weeks since I’d last seen him in person. I sat to his left, at the bar’s corner, my body scanning for what our previous attachment felt like. I didn’t feel anything because the atmosphere was crowded, festive, and loud. When…
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Shards of glass shoot toward my protective eye goggles as I hear my husband grunt “Arrhhhh” as he swings a metal crowbar towards a 1970s beveled vase. I notice the nerves in the left side of my neck and a headache forming above my eye. My body is starting to slow down, and I feel…
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“Take a deep breath and fill your belly with air, in through your nose and out through your mouth.” Ally gently guides us through a trauma-informed yoga practice. I notice the rubber mat beneath me and the earth holding me. I am gathered with eight women fighting to find goodness in our bodies, vessels that…
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Prior to entering a new patient’s room, I review words and numbers in a chart in order to gather as much information as possible. Reading a patient’s chief complaint, I learn about the nature of his or her visit whereas her past medical history gives information that begins to tell a story about what her…
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The day I got my first period holds the distinction of being one of my most humiliating memories. I was totally unprepared and felt terrified that the presence of blood signaled my impending death. Looking back, my lack of awareness is hard to fathom. I was the third of four girls in my family, so…
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