Seven women trek carpool cars to my house, as I straighten couch pillows just one more time. . . middle school mirror looking turned to house tidying. Faces illumine my kitchen filled with a pot-luck patchwork feast. Puzzle-piece dishes in artful proportion nourish laughs and kind questions that expand the eight chairs squeezed to fit the table. Different editions of the same book wrinkle couch pillows, and I don’t notice as eyes point to one another, the TV invisible. And we’re together. And we each belong to the laughter and the conversation. Wiping the counter and clearing silent plates, I soak in a prayer of thanks that leaves me and the dishwasher full, like normal, more blessed than I deserve. Toothbrush in hand, middle school me looks back in the mirror. I can’t help smiling at her, with voices echoing in my ears, the type of voices that give us courage: unique, yet not so different from our own.
Evi Wusk 
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