For several months, I have been meeting with a group of friends for the sole purpose of sharing and holding one another’s stories. These have been stories of laughter, beauty, pain, and complexity. Each time we meet, someone volunteers to tell their story based on a selected theme. It has been fascinating to recognize the Providence in who tells what story and when—often stories we hadn’t planned to share ahead of time…

Dear Friends and Family,

Thank you for journeying with me thus far with Behold…

Last week, I shared the first installation of my recently unearthed childhood story, The Christmas Pony, written at age 9. If you didn’t read it, that’s okay. All you need to know from Chapters 1-2 is that my alter-ego, Julie, found a black stallion on Christmas Day…

This week, I will be featuring a guest writer named “My-9-Year-Old-Self.” She is honored to be here and promises to be on her very best behavior…

Because the sky is not dark until after ten in Washington summer evenings, Drew and I often find ourselves a bit aimless after dinner. In the winter, the sun begins to set around four so we often find ourselves in bed around nine. But in the summer, sun guilt prevails…

Last week Drew and I visited my grandparents in Montana. Being together brought us much joy as we laughed and reminisced about the wonderful life they’d led—a life that has blessed and shaped my own. But our time was also filled with honest conversation about the painful reality of death. As we left my grandparents’ home one evening, my heart was full of both joy and sorrow, levity and heaviness…

This week, I found myself deep in contemplation while driving east on I-90. My husband and I were traveling to visit my grandmother, whose health is failing. On this particular stretch of the journey, I typically look forward to a meteorological phenomenon I call “Toy Story Clouds.” You know, the pristine white ones with the fluffy tops and flat bottoms, brilliant against an endless blue sky—the clouds Pixar perfected…

I wrote this week’s poem in a time of quiet in which I was able to observe the busy bees outside my window, singular in their intent of sweetening and blossoming the world, one flower at a time…

In February of this year, I dreamed of stones. In my first dream, I am looking down at a smooth, milky white stone in my hand…

Have you ever played the game “Two Truths and a Lie”? It is an ice breaker commonly played at parties that is marginally fun, mostly stressful. I do not like ice breakers. When someone says, “Let’s do an ice breaker,” I immediately start to sweat and get clammy palms…

She entered my office slowly, shuffling across the carpeted hallway and hesitantly hovering near my open door. I welcomed her and she sat down in one of the purple velvet chairs that had held the sacred stories of many women before her who had come to our shelter in pursuit of recovery from homelessness, addiction, and domestic violence…

For better or worse, the women in my family are known for their devastatingly keen sense of smell. When confronted with overwhelming odors such as certain heavily cologned and dimly lit mall stores selling hip teens’ clothing, the result is headache or nausea. When encountering everyday smells, it is a fantastic tool for detection…

Minutes before Drew and I shared our first kiss (huge deal, by the way), we found ourselves swimming in the frigid waters of British Columbia’s Howe Sound…

Moving during a pandemic in October means that at best, you will get to meet your neighbors across fences and from several yards away. Such conversations may involve a good deal of polite shouting and animated gesticulating to understand one another…

This week I have the joy of sharing my story of how God initiated a season of healing and freedom for me through my trip to the Philippines in 2018…

A month ago I received a phone call from an unknown number, which I answered *solely* because I believed it was my eye doctor…

On the night of November 9th, 2018, my bridesmaids and I were gathered in a small upstairs room, laughing and talking, surrounded by half-eaten bowls of popcorn, squashy pillows, and bright piles of wrapping paper from just-opened gifts. As I looked around the room, it felt surreal to be surrounded by the same circle of women who had surrounded me at my first wedding years before, and who continued to support me through the pain of the years to come…

Shortly after we were married, Drew and I attended a faith-based conference together. At the end of an early morning session focused on Lament, we were invited to walk down an aisle to the front of the auditorium, where a large canvas featuring a black outline of Jesus’ face awaited us…

I have always been ashamed of how easily I cry. If it occurred in private settings only, that would be fine. But the number of times I have cried in public when speaking at a microphone and/or in front of more than five people who are not family or friends is. . .embarrassing…

I remember the first time he confessed. I sat rigidly in a wooden chair from my friend’s kitchen table, dragged into the study so we could have some privacy. My body felt small and cold; my jaw was clenched. I knew something was wrong, and was bracing myself for pain…