The door opens. A home screen. A blank document. A blinking cursor. A vast red tent. An expansive table. A seat for me. “Friendship” reads the place card. The host invites me, “Tell us a story.” And so I do.
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All articles filed in Writing
A Seat at the Table
I wrote for Red Tent Living for almost exactly eight years before ever meeting Tracy Johnson in person. We had, of course, communicated via email, but I did not have the opportunity to spend time with her in “real life” until I attended the Sacred Interruption retreat in Knoxville last October. I was deep in…
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A Life-Changing Invitation
Seven years ago the four of us sat in our new living room talking. My husband and I had just had dinner with our longtime friends and counselors, Tracy and Mark Johnson. I’m not sure how it got brought up, but we were talking about how much I love writing and how much (since becoming…
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Bearing Witness
My words went live on Red Tent Living for the first time on my 40th birthday. Ten years and over 60 posts later, I now know that they were more than words. They’ve always been so much more than words. In the space so generously offered to me, I gave generously back. I let you…
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A Blessing
Tracy Johnson asked me to support her new endeavor, Red Tent Living. I know how difficult it has been for me to ask for support for mission trips or the founding of a new graduate school. It is humbling, for me, to ask for anything. I did not want Tracy to have an awkward pause…
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Hello Dear Friends
Over a decade ago, my mother, Tracy, welcomed you to a tiny corner of the internet that was slowly unfolding as Red Tent Living. The website was always intended to be a place where women could come and connect in the middle of our messy and hard ordinary. Red Tent Living wasn’t about perfectly curated…
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Funny Girl
Twenty-one years ago, my sister shared a joke with my parents that made them belly laugh. I heard the laughs and saw the smile on my sister’s face, but only one thing raced through my four-year-old mind: “I want to make people laugh too.” I announced that I, too, had a great joke and assured…
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Renaming Myself
It took some time before I uttered the words. It was much like new lovers who hesitate to speak a risky “I love you.” It was a courageous declaration. A couple of years after I’d begun to write for public consumption, I had to submit an updated “bio” for an introduction. After reviewing my extracts,…
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A Bend in the Road
I’d booked a room of my own for a week at a lodge on the outskirts of Cosby, Tennessee—a town too sleepy to care if you call it the middle of nowhere. Set just off a creek where horses grazed freely on miles of green meadow, the lodge I’d chosen had a wraparound deck, a…
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Writer’s Block
My deadline looms before me, but I have nothing to offer. Not a word. I know all I need to do is start writing, and before long, I’ll be finished, but sometimes starting seems impossibly difficult. I turn my attention from the window I’ve been gazing through to my laptop, open a new document, and…
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