When opportunity arrives

My nearly three year old Sprout settles into my arms in a familiar way that I can’t even describe. It is a language we share, between our bodies. Another way of saying LOVE, this thing that we do, folding into each other, his small arms and legs wrapped around my torso, the heft of him [...]

Slowly, softly, the new year arrived here:

I’ve been wanting so very much to show up here and tell you things, but with the new year came a fever—the kind I remember having as a little girl, and all I was able to do was curl under thick down covers and sleep. It’s not something I make time for readily: resting deeply, [...]

Five minutes seen + heard, and a prayer:

I am in Rite Aid buying C batteries and a 3-pack of scotch tape, and I pause in the isle of match box cars, considering a pair of matching red and yellow ones to stick in the boy’s advent calendar for tomorrow, and there he is. Towheaded, not quite waist high, in a blue action [...]

How to fall in love with your life: the wisdom of little boys

Bean is watching my every subtle move. We are in the middle of a game of “alligator” and Sprout, perched on the couch cushions above us launches himself suddenly through the air, chubby thighs bare, and lands between his brother and me, straddling my chest, laughter erupting. Alligator is a game that Bean invented. It [...]

No one prepared me for this: The end of my baby’s babyhood

He’s out in the sandbox, sunlight falling across his cheeks, and I am at the table writing. Through the window I watch him wipe his eye; watch as he rubs sand into his forever long eyelashes. He rubs it again, this time like I have taught him-—not with his sandy fingers, but with the sleeve [...]