An Unexpected Journey

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Something is Missing

“ Mommy, something is missing.” The words she utters as I am trying to slide out the bedroom door. “What’s missing, baby?” I say, slightly annoyed at the delay in my escape. “Is it a stuffed animal or you need another kiss?” “I don’t know. I just feel like something is missing.” It’s dark outside, and I am ready to move past bedtime… but the words are unusual. She is only 6. Several nights in a week or two we repeat this scenario. I finally think to tell her, maybe her heart wants God’s presence. I pray with her and tell her to talk to Him when I leave- to tell Jesus she loves Him and ask Him to fill up what’s missing. Another week or two goes by, and I forget. It’s so easy in the midst of the busy and the “urgent” to forget the significant. Sometimes we barely even notice it. Social media calls and the tv blares, and often the real is overlooked. Buried up under all that soul noise. Or blanketed by the to do list. “Mommy, something is missing.” Those words agai

Mimi is Home

Her raven black hair pinned neatly out of her face, she gave the children a stern look before following it with a quick smile. Her almond shaped green eyes flashed as she continued the grammar lesson she had diligently prepared for her students. There would be no acting out in Mrs. Turner’s room. Or bad grammar for that matter. She had worked hard to get her education degree, and took both the job of teaching and the job of loving these little people to heart. It had been no small challenge for her to go back to college while raising four children, supporting her traveling husband, and juggling a household. Mrs. Turner’s dedication spilled over into her everyday interactions in the classroom. And the Sunday school room. With a smile on her face and a bible full of notes in her lap, this same lady whose expressions could make those children sit up straight also greeted a group of women weekly with warmth that kept them coming back. Every week. For decades. Lucy, as

Unprepared

I was walking up the steps into the school for work when I looked down and gasped. I didn’t have on any shoes! How had I gottten dressed for work and come all the way here with out any shoes?! Unprepared. I was unprepared. Thank goodness it was a dream! In the next dream I was driving home to get my shoes. I was taking the same old familiar roads, but every time I would get ready to make a turn, I realized there were “One Way” signs. The roads had changed! I kept having near wrecks because the once familiar route had completely changed! The last left turn seemed to be clear until I realized I had turned right onto a railroad track. Then I saw it. The oncoming train. There was no time. I turned hard on the wheel of the car and hit the gas to get off the tracks and crashed the vehicle into the woods. Unprepared. I was unprepared for the changes. The order of the dreams is a little fuzzy now…. that same night I also dreamed I was swimming in the lake. I saw a

Makiah's 10th Heaven Day

He came running into the house yelling in such a panicked voice that before my brain could process the words, my heart had processed the anguish, and I thought someone was dead. Eliana and I were snuggled up on the couch in our PJ’s reading a book while Cameron and the other three were outside. The big girls were riding their bikes and trying to get that last bit of energy out before the sun sank into the horizon. Suddenly he burst through the back door and for just a split second the horror of another day when there was panic exactly 10 years ago today flooded my soul like a tidal wave. I am sure that same wave had washed over him just minutes before. Our road had just been repaved that morning, and there was still gravel left on the edges. When Abby turned her bike into our driveway, she lost her balance and fell in just such a way that her permenant front teeth hit the concrete lip on the end of the driveway. Her two front teeth were literally shattered in half. We didn’t eve

The Fire That Should Make Us Ask Questions

“ Wow! So sorry to hear about your friend. It is sobering when someone we actually know dies before what seems to be their time...” Words I stumbled on today in my emails from a decade ago. What struck me is that I wrote them just three short weeks before my Makiah died suddenly. I had no way of knowing as I penned those words that in just 21 days I would wake up to her last day. I could never have imagined it. And now. Now I look around at the seeming chaos of 2020. The year where the only thing certain seems to be uncertainty. And reading those words and the eery heaviness with which they sit on the page begs me to ask the question. What are we living for? Not what is my purpose.... that’s a different question.... but what purpose am I actually LIVING my daily life for? Am I living for more me time, for a few more moments with social media, or maybe for that elusive next vacation? Is my aim to check off all the boxes for today, to be a great _____ (fill in the

The Empty Chair

The world. Full of sorrow. Heaviness. Heartbreaking injustices. Heroic peaceful protests. Fear inducing, violent riots. Nights of broken glass. Chaos. Masks. Hiding away. Germs. Wash your hands. We cannot wash our hands. Of this world. Broken, bleeding calling out for light in the darkness. Screaming at us to join the frenzy of panic. To fight with weapons that are carnal. To forget who the real enemy is. Distraction. Blame. Offense. Fear. Reaching insidious tendrils right up to wrap around our minds. But there is another voice. In the secret. In the quiet. Calling. “Come be still and know that I am God.” Do you hear the love call? A king who doesn’t need us. He wants us. Wants you. A Daddy’s lap where confusion fades away. Peace envelopes. The divine and humanity are connected there. The view may still be foggy. The way partially obscured. To our frail eyes. But there are two seats. Only one is empty... the love call. Can you hear the b