Love Means Showing Up
When I worked at a church in Oxford, Mississippi, I remember a church member commenting, “I get so tired of people saying to me, ‘It must be so amazing to live in such a fun town all year long.’ They are only here for a few Saturdays in the fall; I live and work and
I feel two emotions when I watch my son in plays or musicals and the curtain goes up at the start of the production. The first is nervousness for the cast and crew; the second is relief that the show is finally happening. The next few hours will be a surprise: I often have no
As a fan of Deshaun Watson and as a feminist, I don’t know what to think about the allegations against him. My daughter Katie is a huge Deshaun Watson fan. While I have no idea who the quarterback was when I was a student at Clemson and don’t know who currently holds that position, Deshaun
A few weeks ago, I visited my son Caleb in Ann Arbor for the first time. He’s a freshman in college and I wanted to see what his new life looked like. The town was enchanting and I loved spending a few days with him. The whole experience was reassuring and wonderful, until I drove
My son was practically crowing in the doctor’s office. Caleb is officially over six feet tall. I wasn’t celebrating with him. In fact, I wasn’t even believing the very clear data that I had just witnessed with my own eyes. When the nurse left, I said, “Maybe we should have her re-measure you. I just
There is no doubt in my mind that adopting black daughters has given me a new lens through which I view the world. I see the details of our daily life differently than I did before. For example, in the county where we live, there are lots and lots of cotton fields. In the fall,
I love calendars and goal setting and the hope of a brand new year. A few days ago, my husband Bryan and I sat down and looked over the goals we’d set for 2018. As I looked back over the year, I noticed that some things that had been priorities just disappeared. We’d had to
I heard him before I saw him. As I rounded the corner into the dairy section of the grocery store, I saw a preschool-age boy really giving his mom a piece of his mind. He had gotten so worked up that he’d thrown his shirt. He was really hulking out. It’s cold in the dairy
Our daughter Elizabeth played rec soccer last spring. I’m pretty sure she was in it for the shoes, but we decided to give it a try. It turns out that she’s pretty fast and soccer was actually a good fit. There was a slight issue, though, with some of the soccer parents. One dad regularly
I couldn’t help but overhear the woman talking loudly in the restaurant about panties. I was out to dinner with my family when I heard a woman say, “Pops, we have big news! We’re wearing panties!!” I leaned to look around the corner, hoping her use of the “royal we” involved a young child. Sure