Lizards and marsupials: my life with creatures

Feathery tickles starting at my temple and tracing along my hairline brought me back to consciousness. The sticky dark of the night fogged my mind and my senses. I couldn’t pull out of the heat-stricken sleep quickly, but the sensation of something being on my face motivated me. It’s impressive how quickly your physical body […]

Walls are hard

The “flour” wasn’t going to cook itself. The girls were happily playing in the living room together and apart, so I decided it was the perfect time to get the tortillas going. Ray calls them flour because they are, well, flour, and we have yet to correct her. I hardly ever keep the baby gate […]

Present in the silence

Sometimes God speaks through the dramatic. In fire, blood, and rolling thunder. Other times he whispers in the wind or wakes a lone boy from his sleep with a soft calling. For me over these last few months, all I’ve heard is deafening silence. We’ve done everything for our children to go back to their […]

Considering it joy

There are several kinds of missionary tales. The uplifting and exhilarating stories of spiritual triumph told over and over during presentations and meetings in our home countries; the edgier stories we swap with our teammates, that really only people living in our context will understand; the “missionary badge” stories of our bouts with malaria, consuming […]

Discovering Christopher Robin

“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.” A.A. Milne “Pooh! Pooh! Pooh! Pooh!” sings Ray in some semblance of rhythm with the Winnie the Pooh song, and with just the right amount of “puff” sandwiching the name. She’s learned what thinking looks like: elbow resting on your hand, fingers […]