I first saw him on a Monday. In a sea of tanned toned bodies jogging or roller blading along Newport Beach’s strand he compelled my attention. He dragged his mostly unresponsive legs using canes that attached to his arm as he crossed the path to sand. Young, with dark hair a little too long to keep out of his eyes, he struggled forward. My balcony faced the sea and afforded me a Discovery Channel perspective of the Pacific Ocean and now of him. Six to eight feet into the sand he began an oval perhaps thirty feet long, out ten feet toward the ocean, north thirty feet and back round. When … [Read more...]
Grit
Falling Into My Father’s Eyes
I am six today. The old farm house is filled with the scent of cinnamon and maple syrup. French toast is my birthday request. I dress with care, and clumsily tie a ribbon in my ponytail. A shiver of anticipation tickles my tummy on my way to the stairs. I wish there was a sliver of light. I don’t want to run my hand along the splinter-filled guard rail to navigate the narrow, impossibly steep stairwell on my way to breakfast. The kitchen is a sea of bodies, ten including my own, settling in around the table. Mama nods and in the doorway stands daddy, a newborn foal in his arms. “She’s yours,” … [Read more...]
To Those of Us Who Had Lousy Mothers – A Toast
Here’s to us. Here’s to creating a life around the hollow left by their inability to mother. Here’s to loving our own children fiercely and well, despite all odds. Here’s to defying the limits our parents and our childhood tried to set. Here’s to life, to love, to hope! Brava or bravo to every one of us who survived. Who felt the pain of betrayal and loss. Who picked ourselves up, dusted ourselves off, and started all over again. Many of us lost entire families, whole communities, affiliations with churches, schools and other organizations. Here’s to every single one of us who endured … [Read more...]
Soar!
The paddock smelled of dung and leather. Excitement quivered through me as I adjusted the riding helmet. I was to take my first formal jumping lesson, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, English style. Mengustu’s ears twitched, perhaps remembering the Emperor’s barns, from which I’d purchased him. The nicker of horses, halters jangling cheerily and clanging of pails made the music of morning at the stables. I loved it. I stood just inside the barn door, the thirteen-year-old girl without a saddle, in pants that were too short for my growing self, and a sleeveless cotton top. Properly dressed girls, … [Read more...]
Sisterhood Rocks
Brandy. She was petite with fiery red hair, a generous laugh, a quick tongue, an agile mind. A spitfire. She fairly sizzled with energy, this woman I first met over the phone when I called the game on my child-molesting dad. I had waited until my children were in school to make the call, my hands shaking uncontrollably, but resolve thrummed through my very bone marrow. This was a first step in a journey I intended to follow through to a conclusion. I thought I had a pretty good idea what it would take. Boy, was that downright wrong. I think it’s fair to say that had I known, I doubt I’d … [Read more...]
Transcending Trauma – Become a Work of Art
Pope Francis compares child sexual abuse to human sacrifice. Think about that for a moment. The comparison is appropriate. But it’s worse than that. We who were abused by leaders in the church continue to live. We didn’t die of our injuries on the altar of sacrifice. Our hearts still beat a tattered pulse. Our brain still holds the truth, and the body always keeps the score. The horror of abuse is followed by a lifetime of adapting. Here are some things I know: I know we can’t un-ring that bell. It happened. I know that Jesus left the ninety-nine in search of the one. I know that … [Read more...]
The Wounded
I am standing on a 10 meter Olympic diving platform. Suddenly, there is a roaring in my ears, a cacophony of sound; voice, noise, high pitched screaming. I clap my hands over my ears – and jump. Fear claws at my throat as I plummet toward the water. Impact is disorienting. Water churns at being violently disturbed, and then? Utter silence, a muted existence, like I imagine a cocoon, or womb. Until the silent screams begin – open mouthed blasts of heart pain – for no one to hear. They reverberate only in my mind. Inevitably I float up to the surface. When I break through the waterline, the sun … [Read more...]
The Buck Stops Where, Exactly?
President Harry S. Truman’s Oval Office desk contained a plaque, set on a walnut base facing his guests, inscribed with: The Buck Stops Here! Shouldn’t that be the Southern Baptist Convention’s working principle, on behalf of its 15 million members? Enter the endless loop: a conversation, or course of action incapable of resolution. Endless loops exist in marriages where partners circle round to the same old argument; they exist in organizations without clear standards of practice; they exist in a denomination whose leadership lobs a crisis back to the local congregation, citing local … [Read more...]
The Perfect Storm
A perfect storm is an event in which a rare combination of circumstances drastically aggravates the event. It was Friday afternoon. Preoccupied and off balance by difficult news about my injured eye, I sought equilibrium in small things. John brought a photo I had ordered in from the mailbox, and left to do a short errand run. No problem. I took a frame from the wall, mounted the new photo, and carefully rehung it. I stepped back to see if it was level, and had my first, and hopefully last, sight related accident. Because I have no peripheral vision I did not see the chair. As I stepped … [Read more...]
Falling Into Community
What cruel twist of fate would offer up sight following a catastrophic wounding of my eye, and then take it away? Seven weeks after saving my eye and regaining vision, a shadow began at the upper left corner and ate away at the light, inexorably slipping down and across vision like a total eclipse of the sun. This can’t be happening, I thought. I’m merely tired, and need to rest. Seven weeks ago I was sightless, but now – or before the eclipse began – I was actually seeing across our beloved river to the mountains beyond, if a bit blurrily. I was grateful. In awe of a body’s ability … [Read more...]
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