I never knew Larry Meyer, but if we should ever meet, I feel like we’ll somehow recognize one another.   Larry was, among other things, the Lutheran campus pastor at the University of Nebraska Lincoln for a time.  I never knew him, but his ripples keep bumping into me. His son, Mikah is embarking on…

The long yellow rolling pin swirled in an almost-circle on the hard wood floor.  I wondered if the short flecks of brown dog hair on the tile would stick to my 10-month-old’s slobber on the end of it. Yum. I’d given my son the rolling pin as something to play with, a new shape to…

My work is a cell phone dead zone, so each day when I emerge from the building, I listen and watch to see if I’ve received any texts.  This past week my phone buzzed and beeped for almost a minute as a string of messages came in one after another, one and then the next,…

The rent was cheap, but the freedom felt rich. I lived with three friends the summer when I turned 21.  Each of us worked a job during the day and returned each evening to our cheap, run-down rental.  I bought large bottles of cranberry juice on our weekly grocery trips.  I had always liked cranberry…

Maria von Trapp swings her guitar and carpetbag in a wide circle and belts her song with gusto: “I have confidence in sunshine.  I have confidence in rain.  I have confidence that spring will come again.  As you can see I have confidence in me.”The Sound of Music will always be one of my favorite movies.…

Does the sweetness of Easter ever leave a bad taste in your mouth? The mounds of colorful candy, the cute white shoes with eyelet lace, the lilies, even the early-morning sunshine sometimes feels saccharine against real life.  Instead of pastel egg Sunday perfection, my life looks more like weekday running to Shopko at the last…

“My low,” she says reviewing the day, “was when we were in the car wash.  I was scared.” I nod and remember her three-year-old body, scrunched in her car seat, her fists clutching the sides of her head like ear muffs as I twisted around the driver’s seat to put my hand on her leg.…

My jaw fell to the ground beneath the jungle gym. I studied my friend’s eyes to make sure she wasn’t messing with me. How could that be the way that babies are made? I wonder if my playground face was similar to the face Mary makes when the Angel Gabriel shows up and tells her she’s going…

“Don’t let the age of this book fool you,” the wise woman said.  “Check out page 39.”   I curled my fingers around the tattered copy of Catherine Marshall’s, Something More, completely unimpressed.  But I hate awkward moments, so I pretended not to notice the yellow, out-dated pages and took it.  If nothing else, I could…