cultivating the beautiful ordinary by sharing our tales and our tables
“Life is decided by inches and seconds.” A wise friend once shared these words with me, asking if I ever wondered about the “what-ifs.” Your beloved dog runs into the street and the oncoming car stops just in time. Another inch, another second, and everything would be different. Your newly-minted 16-year-old casually tells you about…
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We sit quietly in the near-dark room. Wood spindles hug hips and back, bare feet touch soft fawn-colored carpet, worn wooden armrests cradle elbows and arms filled with the weight and warmth of her. Feet push gently against the soft carpet, silence broken by the creaking voice of the old rocking chair. Voice speaking from…
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My sister died a few months ago at the end of May. It was morning. She had been sitting in her chair, in her pajamas, and it seems, she simply passed. She had been having pain issues due to a recent series of falls. Even so, her death was unexpected. She was 59 years old. Truth be…
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When I was young, my faith was expansive. I listened as friends told desperate stories of an unplanned pregnancy; of the fear of deportation; of the explosive anger of a boyfriend she couldn’t stop loving; of the courage it took to tell parents of a same-sex attraction. I shared my own fears, desperations, and foibles,…
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This morning, I went back to church. For more than two years, like many, I have been provided with and found reasons to attend church virtually or, truthfully, not at all. It has been a sort of rebellion. Rebellion against decades of church involvement and all the forced Sundays of my youth. A rebellion against…
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Give me a loyal pup and a handful of people and there isn’t much else I need. Other than dog food. And a decent cup of coffee. Sixteen years ago, I received a photo of a palm-sized black fluffball with a white star on his chest. Born in Belize, he was the love product of…
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“Please stop watching.” The round, green eyes of my traveling companion flash as she whispers these words toward me. We are sitting in a crowded, delayed airplane stuck on the runway. Hot, stuffy, and impossibly close. Bodies of all sizes are wadded into same-sized seats like so many sausage parts stuffed into casings. The man next to me,…
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I turned 60 a few days ago. How about that? Sixty. 21,900 days. I am likely about 2/3 the way through my imagined years. I don’t often think about measuring time, but significant birthdays have a way of making more obvious the ways we keep our time. As friends and family called to celebrate with…
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There is a photo I love that my daughter took on a southern beach several years ago. Brown curls float around my freckled face in the sea breeze. Sitting in the sand and gazing toward the horizon, I watch salmon and burgundy-colored clouds float to position for the sunset. Golden hour lights fine lines and…
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And on the day when she comes to the end of all she will learn, she will still be yours. No matter where she runs, no matter if she hides, no matter. She is inescapable to you. You are inescapable to her. Maybe this is what she already knows.* She has “wise eyes.”
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