In the transition from vocational ministry to who-knows-what, I found myself stocking shelves and cashing orders at a little boutique in North Barracks Road which sold French and Italian pottery and linens. This was the last place a college-educated and...
The house was swelling with song and the windows were sweating from the collision of packed bodies in a small brownstone space against the stark winter air. I didn’t think we were going to a house party, I thought, my dander already up. We entered to the sounds...
It was an hour drive between Charlottesville and Richmond on a day that my wedding rings hadn’t yet worn a ridge into my finger. This was a blink compared to our longer road trips, but something about no exit plan at a highway pace made our car a recurring...
I don’t know her first word. I don’t know when she rolled over or started to crawl. I didn’t see her crack her first smile. Those milestones mark the first year of life. What about years two, three, four, and on? And if they are here today and gone...
The late-summer sun hung hot over the Blue Ridge, but this little valley was nestled far enough in its shadow that we felt some temporary reprieve. Men with sweat-kissed faces, old college chums maybe, gathered under the tent’s center strumming their banjos and...
This fishing rod was to be an olive branch. On the way out the door to go get it, days before his birthday, we had another rub. The same conflict or a new conflict, I wasn’t sure. They had begun to blend, all of them, into one great echo. Would we ever come out of...
