It had been a week and Oona was still in a cocoon. No one really wanted to wake her unless we had to. She wasn’t eating, or she wasn’t eating much. She would take a sip from a straw if one of us gave it to her, and then she would settle back into the…
Chapter Six – All the World is a Stage, and I’m an understudy…
I wished I had just followed through with the call to Charles to pick me up and not allowed Robbie to drive me. I hate awkward silence, and he was quiet and preoccupied the whole way back to the park. There were a couple times that I imagined myself grabbing the steering wheel and jerking…
Chapter One – It is what it is
I will never forget the moment the thought entered my head, “Your parents don’t love you.” I was a second grader, and I had just picked up my lunch from the cafeteria and sat down to eat with the rest of my class when I saw the younger kids at the table across from me,…
You've heard it, right? "The rain falls on the just and the unjust." We quote it quite often to imply that bad things happen to good people, but do we possibly have it backward? Rain could mean blessings, after all it takes rain to grow a crop and to provide a break from the drought.…
Magnetic
As a teen, I wondered what would make me more attractive to those around me. I knew I wouldn't be the most beautiful or the most talented or even the most talkative (shocking, I know!), but I wanted to be someone who stood out. I struggled to feel important and even necessary at some points.…
Waist Deep
It's that moment. I'm standing waist high in the ocean..mere feet from shore, with my feet planted. For the longest moment I stand, face lifted upwards, the glow of the sun feeding my weary soul. I could stay here forever, basking in the peace of its rays, but just as I get comfortable, inhaling the…
The Siren’s Song
There's a pain, a numbness, a vacancy left inside one who is molested. It doesn't matter so much the degree to misuse or abuse... The hole presses in with the smallest infraction. There's a shame that comes with the wounds made then that make the scar now that much more noticeable - a guilt that…
Life is loss.
In Ann Voskamp’s book “One Thousand Gifts” this is her admission, her announcement, her proclamation. Life is loss… when, what, who will you lose? It’s not a matter of will I lose, but solely when will I lose. Loss is familiar to me. One of my first childhood memories is wrapped in death.…
Little Orphan Annie
The other day at the movies, we saw a preview for the new Annie. I'm going to have to see more than that one trailer to judge whether or not I'm going to see it. You see, "Annie" holds a special place in my heart. The roles played by Carol Burnett, Albert Finney, Bernadette Peters…
A Missing Missive
Graham Cooke said that "God doesn't focus on what is wrong with us, rather, He is attending to what is missing." My daughter wants to be a cheerleader. This is a pretty tall order - Not because she isn't capable but because she is missing some key components in order to do so. As a…
Leslie A. Lamb 