Messy, bloody, and inconvenient. From seventh grade beginnings to 52-year-old endings. That 40-year journey was often so … earthy. Yet, there was potential in each month. My body was ready, willing, and able to partner with God to create life! Menstruating was a reminder that I was a part of creating. I was not in…
What’s that old saying? Man makes his plans and God laughs? My husband, David, and I had talked about dreams we had for our empty-nest years: Taking our tandem bike to several exotic destinations. Opening a unique bed-brunch-and-bikes place (since I’m not a morning person, the breakfast idea wasn’t going to fly). Selling our house…
“Do one thing every day that scares you.” Mary Schmich, a columnist for the Chicago Tribune (June 1, 1997) wrote that advice to newly graduated students. Even though I graduated decades ago, something about that quotation stuck in my heart. I ruminated on it for days. “Do one thing every day that scares you.” Interesting…
Sitting in the waiting room with dilated eyes, I could only make out pictures and headlines in the magazine I thumbed through. I saw a set of bullet points—some sort of symptoms—and as I squinted I recognized one after another. Feeling more sad than usual; Often aggravated; Crying easily; Experiencing a loss of meaning and…
Of all of our friends, my husband and I were most looking forward to the empty nest. We were going to be great at it! We’d travel. We’d go to the symphony. We’d eat out every night. We’d take romantic long weekends at least once a month. We were planning a wonderful post-kid life. My…
As a lifelong reader and writer, I’ve always been attuned to language, perhaps the same way a painter is attuned to light and color, or a chef to texture and flavor. The words we use, their resonances and layers of meaning, deeply affect me, making something like reading a poem exhilarating, while sometimes making life…
I began reading a book this fall titled Healing Through the Dark Emotions, where author Miriam Greenspan offers insights into the healing properties of what many of us deem “negative” emotions. She argues, from a mostly secular and therapeutic viewpoint, that instead of avoiding that which causes us pain, we must accept pain as a…
I plant seeds on a cold February day, imagining a garden some months in the future. I pinch the tiny seeds out of their packets, some no bigger than a flake of black pepper, carefully pushing them beneath the soil in the miniature peat pots. I water them “generously,” as the Farmers Almanac suggests, then…
When I got the email, it felt like a slap in the face. A cold, disembodied feeling stole over me. All I could say was, “Oh.” My husband and I had recently been embroiled in a debate with our church over the role of women in leadership. With his full support and blessing, I penned…
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who lived in a snug wooden house deep in a forested valley. There was a shallow, rocky river across the dirt road from her front door with a rope bridge to Widow Pearson’s cottage downstream and an old brick bridge she liked to ice skate to…
When I was in high school and college, I drove really fast (did you know a 1983 Toyota Tercel shakes when you approach 80?). Over the years, I’d slowed down, but still cruised over the speed limit. But on July 2, 2007, I started driving the speed limit. It wasn’t a speeding ticket or an…
This issue of the Redbud Post is one of the most painful ones we’ve run. Each woman shares the trauma of living in a society that has run amuck sexually. We tell their stories that others may find help and hope. And we also tell their stories in hopes that it will foment change in…
There is a significant age difference between my boss and me. Me:17. Him: I don’t know, really, maybe in his 40s—old enough to be married, to be a manager, to have his own office. Still, I consider him a friend. We chat, banter, and sometimes things get a little too flirtatious. But I don’t mind….
Nobody can find strength to resist temptation, perseverance in purity, and lasting forgiveness without community. Shepherds, teachers, mentors, leaders: You have people under your care who are engaging in self harm to externalize pain and contemplating suicide to end pain because they are being crushed beneath suffering and sin. Female sexuality has historically made spiritual…