cultivating the beautiful ordinary by sharing our tales and our tables
“You are becoming an Enneagram 7 in your second half of life,” my husband says with a knowing smile after I share my plans to apply for tickets to be in the studio audience of Saturday Night Live. As an Enneagram 2, I have spent hours during my first half of life reading people’s microexpressions…
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“A tulip doesn’t strive to impress anyone. It doesn’t struggle to be different than a rose…Look at little children in kindergarten. They’re all different without trying to be. As long as they’re unconsciously being themselves, they can’t help but shine.” – Marianne Williamson On the last week of kindergarten, with parents and grandparents present, our…
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“I can see it’s difficult for you to take a deep breath,” said my massage therapist as I attune to the calming scent of the lavender essential oil diffusing from her office. I notice my shallow breathing and the tenuous task of attempting to breathe through my diaphragm. My nervous system stays on guard, scanning…
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“You’re too young to be married,” said Lottie to my husband after we returned from our honeymoon. Lottie, one of our clinical supervisors in our Master of Counseling program was speaking of his developmental age, not his biological age. “You are still a little boy looking for a mom,” she said.
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At my dermatologist’s office, I focus on the smell of the Sharpie she is using to circle areas of concern. As a skin cancer doctor in the Sunshine State, she is trained with a meticulous eye to incise and biopsy anything that is not an A+ mole. While I’m thankful for her fastidious care, this…
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My tears remained hidden behind a set of cheap sunglasses as I strolled through Target, passing newborn moms relieved to be out of the house. Equipped with Ergos, bottles, and pacifiers, they strolled precious, wide-eyed babies in bright red grocery carts secured with cushioned cart covers. Several of my friends had recently announced they were…
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“All you need to remember is how it sounded when you stood in the place of death and heard the living call your name.” – Jan Richardson After several trusted friends recommended it, I sat down for the first episode of The Chosen. The series begins in 2 B.C. with young Mary in Magdala. Frightened and…
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The long trek from the maternity ward to the NICU requires a wheelchair and a hospital transporter. Michael has just left for a few hours to check on our two- and four-year-old daughters, who are at home and can’t meet their baby sister. I feel the shift as we roll from a floor of lactation…
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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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“The irony of man’s condition is that the deepest need is to be free from the anxiety of death; but it is life itself that awakens it, and so we must shrink from being fully alive.” — Ernest Becker I have been struck recently by some people’s freedom to talk about death. The number of recessed…
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