Awhile back I spent a few nights in my hometown, Indianapolis. (Apologies to some of you I didn’t see…I always have to make hard choices, as I have friends on the eastside, westside and all around the town!)  When in Indy, I always plan some time to visit my parents and grandparents in Crown Hill Ce...

Sunday morning after
one of many parties,
my parents hung-over
from boozing too hardy,
spoiling plans of mother's
to take us on a hike;
she, spiting my father,
fried chicken through the night. 

Crisp the day in autumn
and paths where turkeys run
were golden as Dad marched
ahead silent, sullen,
in bitterness a...

Human effort, “elbow grease”, isn’t enough to save our souls.   However, human effort can produce wisdom for a person or a community or a country.  But it’s a certain kind of human effort.  It is the effort to push the ego out of the way, to strive for humility and service.  This effort is fueled by...

Trading her nest
of taffeta and tulle,
laying her buzzed and peach-fuzzed head
on crisp linen
hospital corners.

And pinned to a gurney by a tangle of tubes
carrying a slowly dripping chemo cocktail,
pried open by a surgeon's scalpel,
as it probes for cancer
in her fragile frame.  

She rises, a bubble
of ef...

 “O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock
The meat it feeds on."         
                                        From “Othello” by William Shakespeare

When my first son was stillborn, I went through a very envious season.  In my grief, I simply could not rejoice...

When I was a youngster, I twisted my ankle often.  We spent hours running in the open backyards of our suburban neighborhood, and uneven grass could trip me up.  After years of these occurrences, my ankle developed a weakness.  I can twist my ankle walking on an uneven sidewalk (particularly if I’m ...

“Death…is Satan’s great weapon and also God’s great weapon:  it is holy and unholy; our supreme disgrace and our only hope; the thing Christ came to conquer and the means by which He conquered.”  C.S. Lewis

There has been a lot of death around us this year.   A couple of weeks ago I had to eulogize...

Our son Court came running up to us at the church coffee hour.  “Mom! Dad! Can I have some money to go to Taco Bell with the other kids?” 

Every Sunday after church a gang of teens and tweens from the youth group would gather and head out on the five-block walk to the local Taco Bell.  This was a m...

In 1981 we were sharing a house with a single friend when our daughter was born.  Patrick was an invaluable extra pair of hands and emotional support as Dave and I began to adjust to life as new parents.  I grew to think that a ratio of three adults to every one child was pretty ideal.

In 1998 when...

A few months ago a young woman who has started a successful online business asked my husband and myself for advice about how to tell the story of its development and its advantages over other programs.  The crux of her inquiry was the question, “Who should be the hero of this story?” That got me thi...