Children

Seeing and Being Seen

Abuse Survivor, Art, artist calendar, bravery, calendar, Children, courage, creativity, curiousity, Faith, grandchildren, hope, obedience, Redemption, testimony, Trust, Vulnerability, waiting, walking, wisdom, writing

Jesus Saw

My grandson wanted his mommy to stay home. It took a bit to help him get to a place of accepting it would be the two of us for just a bit. I held him close, hand on his back and my cheek against his head.

“I know. I know.” I said.

Homemade pizza for breakfast softened his little longing and then within minutes he said , “G’Ma let’s paint!” 

I painted. He continued his fascination with paper and Elmer’s glue. 

Earlier,  my not yet daylight drive brought thoughts that became a string of connectedness and a new way to see a longing I’ve always known. 

The longing to be seen.

Late afternoon now and I’m thinking of how the hurts we experience or the lack we may have known are parts of stories we do very well to come to terms with even if we’re never able to make them make sense. 

I walked without sound other than the leaves rustled up by the wind. I realized I should never go back to noise in my ears on my walks again. 

I’m beginning to think more clearly, to love making sense of things and then putting words to them. To love writing again. (Doing my best to have intentionality in writing here)

A memory came as I walked. One so clear it could’ve been that very October day so many years ago.

There are countless memories I can’t grasp and I’m afraid even more I wish my mind would loosen its grip on. 

I told a friend yesterday that I often think of quitting when it comes to creative expression. I told her I knew I could not. I knew I never would. I knew it might always be a painful thorn for me, the reality of the way it pains me emotionally to feel unseen, worse yet ignored or rejected. 

I know the reasons why and that knowing helps me take very good care of this tender ache. All the same, I wish it did not pain me so after so very long. 

I remembered that memory too hard to share, better kept to myself and I told myself gently it’s a gracious miracle that you are here and that you’re an artist. 

And that little chat with myself as I walked is a beautiful truth.

I certainly know it’s only my “being seen and known” by God all along the way that has both equipped me and generously given so very much. 

I heard two women on a podcast today talking about mountains and valleys. I heard one talk about Moses not making it to the promised land after all he’d struggled to do in obedience and all the years of wilderness wandering with people he was called to lead who were not always grateful followers. 

The podcast hosts talked of how that seemed to them so very wrong, so unfair to Moses. But who are they, who are we to get to decide how far God will let someone’s dream/calling come to fruition? 

After all, God is God and we are not. 

I listened as the woman continued. She had a catch in her voice as she began to share the realization that gave her immeasurable hope. 

She read about another time Moses is mentioned. This time he is right beside Elijah and alongside Jesus as our Father God proclaimed, “This is my Son”. 

And so, the realization came that after forty earthly years, Moses did not enter the promised land but we get to be sure he made it. The promise was fulfilled. 

I remembered this podcast while walking and I remember driving back home on the same “grandma day” road as I felt my eyes become wet with tears. 

A thought came. 

I will be painting in heaven, in heaven I will paint. 

I remembered the early morning thought alongside this confidence. I thought of my longing to be seen, how I’m trying to understand the need in ways that I can grow from. 

Three people came to mind. The man paralyzed on a mat, Zacchaeus, and the woman with the blood stained clothes. 

I thought of the man lying flat on his back while others bathed in a pool that led to healing. Because he’d been an invalid for so many years I wondered if there were days others tried to either convince him to try or actually helped him into the water and then, after a while he’d developed a reputation. Maybe onlookers concluded he’d accepted his debilitating condition, no need to try, just look away.

But, Jesus came one day and told him, “Get up”. Sort of I know you’ve been here a long time and it makes no sense now to try, but I see you. I want you to try. 

“Jesus saw him laying there…” John 5:6-7

I think of a tax collector, a man with a reputation who maybe wanted to undo all of his greed motivated wrongs. A man climbed a tree just to see Jesus. Jesus looked up. Jesus saw him and changed his life. 

“And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up…”

‭‭Luke‬ ‭19‬:‭5‬ ‭ESV‬‬

I think about the woman in blood covered garments in the midst of a curious throng. She didn’t want to be noticed by anyone, just get close to Jesus. No one paused to see her, a woman desperate and dirty. But, Jesus felt her reaching for him and then he turned and saw her. 

“Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter…”

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭9‬:‭22‬ ‭ESV‬‬

I’ve just finished up three collages layered deeply with torn paper and another painting has been sealed. My idea for abstracts telling the story of God’s enclosure of us in His fold is in the initial brushstroke phase. 

I’ve just proofed the 2026 Calendar and I’m a bit joyous over its beauty. Even more over the hope that the artwork inspired by “Whatever is lovely…” (Philippians 4:6-9) will be a hopeful mainstay for others. 

You can purchase a calendar here:

2026 Calendar

“Artist and writer”, a tagline on a letter I just sent as an introduction to my writing hopes. 

I won’t lose heart. I will always hope and hope I see others in ways that they need.

I pray my words and my art offer hope.

Secret Things

aging, birthday, bravery, Children, contentment, courage, daughters, Faith, family, hope, love, memoir, Motherhood, Redemption, Trust, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder

There’s a verse I love that helps me make sense of both tragedy and unanswered questions…of longings for different.

“The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever…”
‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭29‬:‭29‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Cooking to Remember

I’m standing in my kitchen remembering a verse I read earlier about “secrets”. A verse about the Lord hearing the cries of his children and also knowing the secret sorrows.

I pulled the big Bible from the shelf.

The one I gave my mama, New King James Version with hardly an underline or turned down corner or bookmark.

I’ve often wondered if she ever opened it or if she just accepted my gift because she knew I needed to give it, a gesture from a daughter hoping to help, to mend, to say something unexpressed.

I looked for the verse and then others I love to compare.

We all carry secret sorrows, longings too long expressed, spoken of so much we’ve exhausted the listeners.

Questions, emotions we cover because we “shouldn’t feel that way after so long or she’s just a dreamer”.

Today, if my mama were here she’d be eighty-six years old. She’s been gone for fifteen years.

I thought to watch the DVD given to us all from the funeral home and then put it back on the shelf.

I can’t really say why. It just felt best.

I have a roast cooking slowly in the oven, green beans very buttery and soon creamy mashed potatoes flavored with mayonnaise.

My husband will wake from overnight working to be met by this gesture.

That’s what I decided felt right on the day of mama’s birth.

That, and not rushing my day but opening again the burgundy large print Bible to the place where the Lord appeared to the amazement of Moses and assured him.

“…For I know their sufferings…” Exodus 3:7 NKJV

Closing the big Bible and deciding to leave it in a place beside me, a slip of paper fell out.

The sweetest thing, a little Sunday School coupon filled out by my daughter.

She’d printed the words and her name and then scratched both out to change her writing to cursive. 😊

It was a note telling me that along with other chores, she would “wash the dishes to honor God and me”.

And I began to feel the truth of being seen by her, the tender recollection of days as a mama that were both tired and trying.

They say the things we long for most that begin very early are

To be seen

To be soothed

To be secure.

Where do you feel you’re lacking? What is the secret ache you’re carrying?

What hurt needs soothing?

God sees you.

God offers a healing balm.

For me it was a note from my daughter that my mama kept tucked away,

the realization that my daughter’s a mama with just as kind and observant a daughter of her own.

Don’t look for answers, just know you are fully known and wait tender hearted and at rest for the evidences of love that will catch you by surprise.

God is everywhere. Don’t forget to notice.

Always

Remember, love lives on.

Christmas Children

Children, Christmas, christmas ornaments, daughters, Faith, family, hope, love, memoir, Motherhood, Peace, Redemption, sons, Trust, Vulnerability, wonder
Christmas Morn

Every morning except Christmas morning, my feet padded softly down the hall and to the outlet that powered the Christmas tree lights.

Then I’d touch the little button on the mantel garland and the soft lights shone sweetly.

On Christmas morning, the lights were left on all night before.

I’m thinking about the kindness of my husband’s gesture.

There was no talk of Santa, no cookies and milk for him, no carrots for the reindeer, no late night sneaking of gifts to the living room.

Still, the lights were shining because it was Christmas Eve.

And try as I might, I can’t not remember childhood Christmases. I both cherish them and with tender caution hold hard memories gently.

This Sunday morning, my whole house is quiet as the predicted stormy weather approaches.

As I do very often, I thought of my daughter and son, wondered what they were doing, hoping their days would be good.

I thought of who I am as a mother and what mothering has taught me. Naturally, a list formed.

Mothering

“I love you” has been spoken or typed without reservation .

I can always count on a weather report from my daughter.

I can enjoy dining out with my son.

I’ve learned to expect adventure, a few times I’ve been invited to tag along.

There will always be opportunity to both laugh at myself and to own my weaknesses.

I will never not secretly see them as little children at times and those times are gifts, precious surprises.

The certainty of their giftedness is a gift to me as is the certainty that they were gifted to me by God.

I think about such things.

Likely more so at Christmas. The solitude invites reflection and resulting epiphanies.

This year my tree will be up until January 7th.

Holding on until Epiphany, as I consider Jesus as a child.

For Jesus as child at Christmas and the child still in me as a mother, I’ll keep the tiny lights on.

Longer than ever before.

Boldly Quiet

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A New Color

We left the gathering, an annual one that’s held in a building adjacent to a country home. The barn-like place is love-filled, its walls are covered with memorabilia and photos representing life and the life spans of family.

We arrive and we move from table to table, from people not seen in a year or so and maybe a couple or a few you may have passed in the grocery store.

The conversations are sweet, it’s a catching up and it’s a reunion for the cousins. They love it. They recognize many families neglect this type gathering.

The one who prays acknowledges this. I mostly observe. I join in and say words when it seems to fit.

That’s not because of the “rules” of the get-together. It’s simply my nature.

My mama used to tell us all that her husband, my daddy saw no need to speak unless there was something important to say.

Although, he was a quiet man, one of few words, I cherish the smoothness of his voice.

I remember the way he paused as he spoke. There was a sense of waiting for the hearer to absorb his contribution.

I listened.

A word woke me this morning.

I added it to my list, a list that came from a realization that in life and in Christmas, we often have grandiose expectations.

We expect Christmas be a certain way. Not to mention the comparison of others’ celebrations.

I wondered how my heart would settle if I decided to

“Expect less, acknowledge more.”

A list was formed.

Safety, Food aplenty, Gifts, Smiles, Gatherings, a sense of God’s nearness, Pink Dawns…

Quietude

Google informed me of the meaning, no surprise I loved it.

Another gift came from Google, a sweet surprise. This word has a color named for it.

A shade that’s a blending of grey and blue and green.

“Quietude” is the chosen name for the HGTV 2025 color.

I finished the 3rd of three paintings last night, large 30×40’s.

The first, “Now Found”,

“Now Found”, detail

the second, “Light and Momentary”

“Light and Momentary”, detail

and the third, “Have Hope”.

“Have Hope”, detail

Driving home from the cousin gathering, my husband wanted to talk. I told him I was talked out, let’s be quiet.

He insisted and prodded me with a well-thought question…

“Who would you like to talk to that you’d be just so captivated by the conversation, on the edge of your seat and just waiting for every word?”

Stubborn me replied, after a few seconds, “No one, that’s a good question but I can’t think of anyone I want to talk to right now.”

He believed me. He knows me well.

But, he spoke in the long pause of accepting my answer.

“I thought you’d say Jesus.”

“Yes, I just thought of that.” I smiled and answered.

We finished the Christmas Eve country drive home and I sat in my quiet spot with my grown son who is often quiet himself.

morning quiet

Understood, I felt understood.

“Accepted”, a word I’m adding to the list of acknowledgments.

“Grace”, too.

Just now, I revisited Christmases past through my photos. Babies have grown, changes have come, tough days have occurred, peace has been given and endurance has become even more a quiet strength for me.

Because I’ve learned and am learning a couple of things from my “telling it to Jesus alone.”

He giveth more grace.

I am loved.

There’s so much more coming for me.

Because I’ve accepted, I’m the “quiet one” and always will be.

“But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me.”
‭‭Psalm‬ ‭131‬:‭2‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Always hope.

I look toward my tall Christmas tree, the one ornament, a tiny home, my granddaughter insisted be for it and my uncertainty because it “wasn’t really me.”

And now I see, the bluish green, a pale teal that’s happy quietly although boldly, its pretty red door sort of calling, “open me”.

How can it be?

The color in me, the quiet color has become an invitation to me being me.

A little house accepted by me, inviting an even bolder acceptance of the strength in the choice to keep hoping.

“As for me, I will always have hope; I will praise you more and more.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭71‬:‭14‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Newfound Wonder

aging, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, freedom, grace, Holy Spirit, memoir, patience, Peace, Redemption, rest, surrender, Vulnerability, wonder, writing

My noticing of feathers had faded until yesterday.

God is everywhere, don’t forget to notice.

One feather, not spectacular at all caught my eye, my face toward the ground.

A few weeks ago, a bird sat in the driveway. It was not tiny. It seemed paralyzed and I thought it must be my place to help it.

Soon, I discovered it was newborn. Large and loud birds began to appear. It was odd, the realization that they saw me as a threat.

I stood only a minute. I was captivated by their aggression and the way the newborn bird began to move away from me, recognizing because of the elders, I might be unsafe.

They were mockingbirds. That’s what they do, it’s the way of God and nature.

Yesterday, I reached for the feather and I wondered why I’d stopped considering my “finding feathers” as sacred as before.

I decided it’s because of my vision being too “far focused”, either looking into my future with uncertainty and fear or looking into my past with longing to no longer “go there”.

Rarely just in the moment.

So, the wonders that once captivated me with simple surprise were less sacred than before.

Sacred, a word that invited itself into my heart a couple of months ago, a word I’d rarely used to describe my life or my living and its contributions as quietly important.

Significant.

An ask came and with my yes came the assurance that this thing I’d been called to do was sacred.

Now, a memorable gift not to others only but to myself because of that realization.

That secretly and intentionally has led to my noticing wonderful things again.

I’m realizing just now that maybe yesterday was different, the joy in my heart when my grandson nodded yes, smiled and gave me a “high five”, the sincerity in my husband’s voice, the giddiness in my daughter’s voice and in her daughter’s brand new dancer’s pose, my son calling to tell me of a new thing he’ll be trying and the subtle excitement in his voice.

I remembered that yesterday and again this morning, I spoke a new prayer, pondered a word I’m newly fascinated over.

I consecrate this day to you, God.

Consecrate.

: dedicated to a sacred purpose

I consecrated my day to the Lord and I began to notice God again in the small ways.

“May we never lose our wonder…wide-eyed and mystified, may we be just like a child.”

Continue and believe.

You are loved.

Look for the wonder.

Healing Observed

Abuse Survivor, aging, beach, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, family, grace, grandchildren, memoir, patience, Peace, Redemption, rest, Trust, Vulnerability, waiting, wisdom, wonder

“And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.”
‭

Solitary Watcher

I’ll likely forget it but I chose “healed” on a reset of yet another password forgotten.

Such is life.

Such is the life of one grandmother on the beach walking, eyes to the crannies and nooks created by the rocky barrier.

Deciding I found the perfect golden conch yesterday.

Announcing to my daughter “I’ve never found one like this before”.

No need for new discoveries today, I just whispered to myself.

That one, a reply to a choice to “find the joy today” on yesterday morning needs nothing more.

Not a grander discovery.

No comparisons.

I’m on the beach alone under the tent erected by my kind son in law. Chairs waiting to be plopped down on remain bottomless.

Surveying all the people. Older ones strolling, younger ones strutting.

Noticing

I consider their lives, curious over their stories.

I remember my self-defensive anger so many years ago when a woman who was struggling and angry over expectations of a program I oversaw,

Shouted at me,

“You don’t understand! You’ve got a picture perfect life!”

And I replied not with shouting but more of a how dare you to presume I’ve never had a “bad life”, I assure you I have not!

Today, walking along the edge of the ocean, glancing up towards our umbrella to greet my family’s arrival,

I realized a new thing.

Discoveries

I paused to pray for healing for typical childhood ailments, for others undergoing treatment and for pending resolutions to questions.

I thanked God for the good things already.

And I felt my breath catch in my chest and stood still to really acknowledge

The realization that maybe thinking of others, praying for others, offering open-handed surrender of others to heaven, rather than prayers and longings for self…

Might just be the evidence of one who is

Healed.

On the way to there, at least.

Farther along.

Because maybe, just maybe my life is not perfect but very

Close to the picture of what is closer and closer than I’d ever imagined.

Because of a heart that’s surrendered to softening, has opened all the locked windows and flung open the doors to hurts hidden, held onto for far too long.

Healed and still healing.

Observing.

Making New Stories

Abuse Survivor, aging, Art, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, creativity, Faith, family, grace, hope, memoir, mercy, patience, Peace, Redemption, Teaching, testimony, Vulnerability, waiting, wisdom, wonder, writing

On Sunday, a sunny day, my granddaughter and I spread out paper, scissors and ModPodge on a towel. We tore pieces of abstract paintings I loved but had not bought by someone or maybe I’d forgotten I loved them.

We used little strips and squares of color to tell new stories. To allow a new voice to be heard.

Keep living, keep learning.

How God speaks is another mystery that woke me on Monday in the dark, a nagging lack because of hearing others say “God told me.” or “I heard God speak”.

I’ve not experienced God in an audible way.

I’ve heard stories that blow my mind of people who’ve been in situations in need of hope or redirection and God spoke. I’ve read and heard He “speaks” through His Word, both gently and firmly instructive.

I’ve heard about the still and quiet voice that comes and I believe I understand this one well

Me being quiet with no searching for an answer and a thought comes…

Comes in reply to a question that’s been nagging at me.

Once, that voice whispered in my the hallows of my chest…

“It’s gonna be alright.” and the rightness of every worry in my life felt captured in that comfort of a promise. It was a strong promise. I still treasure it.

I smile over it.

This morning, words came and to sum it all up, the words were

“Just keep learning.”

An encounter with a woman I knew from my executive days planted the seed from which this desire has begun slowly growing.

She noticed my artwork and then as she passed through the crowd to leave, said across the room…

“I just read your story.”

I was confused. How did she read the “Artist Story” I sometimes point to when people ask, “How’d you become an artist?”

Later, I realized she’d only read the sweet story of the “cake with you Mama day”.

And, I realized slowly, I was happy that’s the only story she’d read.

This morning, I thought, sensed the coming together of thoughts and God speaking…

It’s been enough time now, enough time has passed.


The story of how you “came back to painting” no longer needs to include the hard and horrible parts.

You’ve grown to dislike the telling of this story.

Instead, when asked, the answer could be…

I’ve been painting seriously about seven years and I keep growing and trying to make good choices.

I keep learning

And I am a student of that desire to keep learning. I have grown.

I am still growing. And that’s the only requirement that is given to me by myself…to be me as artist, writer, mother, wife, grandmother or friend…follower of Jesus.

To be brave enough

To keep learning.

(It may be time to add a chapter or replace the old one altogether, at least edit it with a pen called kindness.)

It may be time to “turn the page” to the beauty of my story with only a tiny nod to the ugly.

It may be time to stop circling back to the places you struggled, the places you failed and fell.

It may be time to say less.

It may be time to edit your story of whatever you’ve taken on as a measure of you finally not just battling in becoming

But arriving.

Motherhood
Author
Teacher
Settled Career
Wife
Friend
Ministry Leader
Artist
Chef
Athlete

Nurse
Husband
Girlfriend
Boyfriend
Instructor of Others

Retiree simply “being a light”
Aunt
Uncle
Counselor
Advocate

Son

Musician
Sharer of your life with others

Daughter

Student of whatever

You are arriving,

you can take a breath.

The only requirement God has is
A decision to keep learning.

To imperfectly decide

not to give up.

And to do so with love.

“…It’s quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor, be compassionate and loyal in your love, And don’t take yourself too seriously— take God seriously.”

Micah‬ ‭6‬:‭8‬ ‭MSG‬‬

Curious about my art?

Quiet Confidence Art

Continue and believe,

LT

Lightly Yielding

aging, bravery, Children, contentment, courage, curiousity, Faith, family, fear, hope, mercy, patience, Peace, Redemption, rest, Trust, Vulnerability, waiting, walking, wonder

It’s the time of year that God allows a sprinkling here and there of soft green woven “pillows”. I know there’s a name for them. I can’t remember it. I just find them so pretty. I tiptoe around them, aware of what I see as fragility.

We walked carefully over the tangled vines and fallen branches. Toddler, Henry in his little boots smaller than my hand. I let him venture barely three steps away from me then wrapped him in my arms to be sure he didn’t high tail it to the place his curiosity was calling.

I heard the water, the creek too shielded by overgrowth to see and too uncertain for us to go seeking. So, we just circled round and round, he intent on going deeper in and me, scooping him up to walk where it was more safe and clear.

He resisted yielding again and again.

The unknown and interesting was a steady call to his little investigative mind.

As if to say, I need to know, I need to see, it must be really special, this place I can’t see, these things I don’t yet know.

Yet, it was too risky for us to go, too unsafe for him to go alone.

I wonder why there’s such resistance to yielding. Why I’m so prone to striking out on my own in fits of figure it out or fix it before it’s too late.

When all that’s required, all that’s an absolute undeserved gift,

Is to yield.

This morning, I flipped to today in “Jesus Calling”, a kind and beautifully patient collection of words I’ll carry as I go, one open hand to heaven and the other secretly imagining my hand like a child’s reaching up again to the suggestion of my Savior,

“Hold my hand.”

“As you keep your focus on Me, I form you into the one I desire you to be. Your part is to yield to My creative work in you, neither resisting it nor trying to speed it up. Enjoy the tempo of a God-breathed life by letting Me set the pace. Hold My hand in childlike trust, and the way before you will open up step by step.”

Continue and believe, lightly yielding.

You are loved.

Tell Me Your Story

Abuse Survivor, aging, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, family, Forgiveness, freedom, hope, love, memoir, patience, Peace, Redemption, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder, writing

I woke from a crazy vivid dream about being on the brink of my “dream job”. I would be partnering with a wise and super professional in every way woman, to be involved in some way with the Atlanta Braves. I was one final interview from the job and from moving to Atlanta G-A!

Now, I sit in the too cold for Carolina weather wrapped in a blanket and pajamas so thick you’d wonder if there’s a body in there.

In my dream, I was escorted by this close to perfection in appearance writer and coordinator of “human interest” activities for the baseball players.

They liked me, were excited. I was “in”.

My mama was there…I introduced her to “Miss Everything” with “this is Bette”.

There were other parts of the dream that were intensely telling. No surprise, I was lost in Atlanta, it was pouring down rain and I was driving in a panic and in the wrong direction on the interstate that would take me to the interstate back home.

I wanted to go home and I would tell “Miss Everything” by phone if I could find my way back to there.

In my dream, I found all sorts of things in my purse, one was a check I’d forgotten about.

Although the amount was only five figures including the two behind the decimal, it was enough.

There are many parts of my life buried deep, many aspirational paths away from who my life has made me.

There are crazy dangerous can’t find my way in the storm scary roads. There are dark ones. There are exciting ones. There are wounds from of all the wounding.

There are bravery required ones.

And who’s to say how bravery is defined?

What God has decided is your treasure and what your legacy will decide unbeknownst to you…for others to say “this was her treasure”.

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭12‬:‭34‬ ‭NIV‬‬

I’ve been reading a variety of memoirs. No secret, I’ve had a long held goal/hope/calling to write my story.

So, I’ve been reading to learn, to learn how the author will engage me in the hard story of their life with an equal measure of softness to get me to the part of it that was redeemed.

There are a handful I’ve shelved.

Call me critical, but I prefer ones the person writes themselves, not a ghost writer.

And books about trauma, abuse or addiction?

Well, there are two I’m grateful I was mature and wise enough to put down early.

I’m sorry to say one was Matthew Perry’s. I couldn’t endure the hardness of him to discover the soft place he eventually found.

I do have favorites and I’ve just downloaded a fourth. I’m not a book critic, so I’ll keep that to myself except to say I was surprised by the authors’ ability to detail their horror without causing fear in me.

This is what I needed, what I believe readers need.

To tell their stories in a way that didn’t cause me harm emotionally. These books are and were gifts. They’ll remain with me.

I see the search that didn’t quit in them to find the quiet treasured pearl in the turmoil and torment of their wounded lives.

Hard to believe, but they found a way to shine.

“I will when I can.” I have pencilled in the back of my Bible. It’s a response to a counselor’s question long ago.

“When do you think you will be able

to write it?”

And my answer, I’ll bravely share…

“When I no longer need to be noticed, when I decide it’s okay to forget.”

This post just got real brave, didn’t it?

My husband woke me from the Atlanta dream saying I’d been “yanking” the blanket.

I stilled myself, smiled in dawn of Thursday and remembered the last bit of the dream.

I found my way home.

My quiet life.

To continue and believe.

“Turn the page, Lisa Anne.” mama

“Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭12‬:‭7‬ ‭NIV‬‬

You are loved.

Like a tiny sparrow flitting back across the cold blue sky to its nest.

You are loved.

So am I.

I Will Go. I Will Stay.

aging, bravery, Children, confidence, courage, Faith, family, grandchildren, memoir, Redemption, Trust, walking, wisdom, wonder

Yesterday, G’Pa announced to Elizabeth and I that he’d never seen the creek. The land is deep and wide around their home and down in the valley on the edge there’s a pretty little creek. I said “We should go see it” and then quickly G’Pa and I said no. It seemed risky I guess. It’d be a big production to get boots on, be sure the grandbabies could be carried safely and even more to remember exactly how to get there when I’d only been once.

Back then, I was fascinated by its beauty, this secret place worth pursuing.

But, we probably made the best choice, two sixty-something year olds striking out on an adventure with a four and one year old. We’ll go maybe with extra help to guide us soon. It’s not something we should do on our own.

Life has things for us to do, scary and uncertain, maybe little secrets that require bravery.

”Don’t be afraid, for I am with you. Don’t be discouraged, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will hold you up with my victorious right hand.“
‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭41‬:‭10‬ ‭NLT‬‬

God woke me up with the thought of His Sovereignty, the reality that wherever I am,

He is too.

I put the thoughts together before daylight, remembering the idea of second children’s book about fear that I had kinda shelved away. It seems the idea might be calling my name to remember and revisit it.

With these new thoughts about walking into obscure and beautiful places even if scary:

I will go if you go.
Through the brittle winter field

And into the forest
Up the hill and down the

hill to the slippery spaces
and up the hill again

Around the corner and careful

don’t step on the vines

with sticky sharp thorns and then the water round the corner will appear

The bubbling shiny place

You made it!
I told you.

I will go with you and
I will stay.

I will go.

I will go if you go.

I will stay.