Helen & Home
Helen & Home Dr. Dixie Dillon Lane After thirteen hours of driving with four young children, Helen, Georgia, was a welcome sight, and not only because it meant the chorus of “Are we there yet?” from the back seats would finally come to an end. No, Helen was not just a place to end our […]
Buried on the Homestead
Buried on the Homestead Dr. Ryan Hanning I buried my youngest daughter’s yearling goat this morning. Despite our best efforts, death always seems to find a way. It is an ever-present reminder that life is short and surprisingly fragile and that we can’t control as much as we would like. This truth has been perhaps […]
Point Me to the Skies
Someday, I dearly hope, we will begin to ask what we can do to make our medicine more human. We might begin with the hospital.
“Tommaso, Tommaso!” cried the old woman down the hall. She could speak nothing but Italian. “Voglio andare a casa!” she said, over and over, weeping, for at least an hour while the nurses tried to calm her down. She was terrified.
I wasn’t too pleased, myself. I lay in a . . .
The Unexpected Visitor
Reclaiming Our Lost Culture of Calling
The Unexpected Visitor Reclaiming Our Lost Culture of Calling Mrs. Carmel Richardson It takes time to make a place a home. When I found myself unpacking our house in a new town last fall, I was prepared to do some work. What I was not prepared for was the new acquaintance who walked up onto […]
Warming to It
Confessions of a Former Suburbanite With a Nonsensical Fear of Fresh Eggs
Warming to It Confessions of a Former Suburbanite With a Nonsensical Fear of Fresh Eggs Mrs. Gina Loehr My son came running into the house, ecstatic, and handed it to me. It was . . . warm. I didn’t know how to react. Feelings of joy and disgust mingled inside of me in equal measure as […]
Home Fires Burning
Home Fires Burning Mrs. Libby O’Neill In this darkest and coldest season of the year, when nature bares her teeth most clearly, our obsession with heat is unsurprising — both as an antidote to winter and a reminder that it won’t last forever. We heat our homes, our cars, our seats, steering wheels, and blankets. […]
Winter Wonder
Winter Wonder Dr. Dixie Dillon Lane It’s 5:45 when I tiptoe into my son’s room. “Okay,” he mumbles and rolls out of bed. Fifteen minutes later, we are walking through a dark wood near our house. He shines his flashlight on the frosty, leaf-covered grass, and I show him the “Tiger Trap” between two trees — […]
Santa & the Daisy: A Short Tale of Pledges, Passages, and a BB Gun
Santa & the Daisy A Short Tale of Pledges, Passages, and a BB Gun Mrs. Gina Loehr Every year my kids send letters to the North Pole. The contents of these epistles often reflect the marketing prowess of the Fleet Farm “Toyland” catalog, which appears earlier and earlier in our mailbox each holiday season. Last year […]
After the Storm
After the Storm Dr. Anthony Esolen And Jesus did not say, but I can imagine that someone inspired by his words might have said, that there was a man with five silver oaks that the hurricane had blown down on his property, in four separate places barely missing the house and the power line, and […]
Pietà: The Womanly Art of Losing Yourself
Pietà The Womanly Art of Losing Yourself Mrs. Carmel Richardson Have you ever seen Michelangelo’s Pietà? The statue depicting a dead Christ in his mother’s arms is called “Pity,” or “Compassion,” which seems to speak to the emotion we feel upon seeing her holding her slain son across her lap. Compassion for the sinner whose […]