* not with ink

This is probably the second most common question I hear about the baby currently in our care, right after, "Will you keep her?" It comes in many forms: "So, what's her story?" "Is her mom in the picture?" "How did she end up in your home? "Is her mom a drug addict?" "How could a mom not love such a cute baby!" I get it. It's natural curiousity, and I know I've asked similar questions of my friends who are adoptive parents. Who  wouldn't  be curious about this sleepy little bear!? But here's what I'm learning: a child's story is their own. And equally as important, the parent's story is their own. Imagine how it might feel to hear that for the foreseeable future, you are not allowed to care for your child. On top of whatever difficult circumstances you are already in - perhaps poverty, social isolation, lack of adequate housing, domestic violence, intergenerational trauma, drug or a...

Our first foster baby came with about 18 hours notice; it was respite care, which means we had him for a few days while his regular foster family had a break/dealt with a family emergency. He stayed 3 nights, long enough to come to church and have a dozen people cooing over his little sleeping cheeks.  With each new visitor to our quiet corner, I explained again that he would be going back to his foster family the next day. Barely a week later, we got a 9am phone call with a fostering request and by the same afternoon, we were snuggling her. This time, we had her for 4 days before church came around. Again, our community was keen to see the little one we had in tow. Again, the question, "How long will she stay?" And this time, "Are you going to adopt her?" Trying out the carrier... -- Here in Toronto, when a child is placed in foster care, it is always for an indefinite length of time. It depends on the parents' situation, and whether they are able to ...

It seems I finally have something(s) to say... Here's the first in a short (or maybe long?) series on Fostering FAQs. If you've got a question to add, feel free to comment/email/text/message me and maybe the next post will be in response. -- 8:30 am on Day 4 of parenting. I woke up in a panic two hours ago because I remembered that there is a baby and I am responsible for her (at least at 6:30am, when the man beside me will snore through anything). Now, I have put on clothes and eaten breakfast. The dogs are walked, there is a loaf of banana bread in the oven. My tea is steeping. Most importantly, Dream Baby is already down for her first nap. Despite my morning efficiency, I'm already beginning to see that even with the happiest, most easygoing, and smiliest baby, like we somehow managed to be given, parenting is a grind. On Friday night, I couldn't join friends for $5 pints at a local joint. Instead, I blearily washed the same 8 bottles again, and then made anoth...

This morning I got up and cleaned up a dog-made mess in the living room, then walked the dogs and cleaned their bowls, and fed the dogs, and took a deep breath. Now, there are muesli scones in the oven (recipe below). The pups are lounging, the husband is sleeping in (it's his day off). While I wait for the scones to finish, I'm reading a research report out of the University of Notre Dame. It's for my job, but it's more than just work. It's relevant to the application I'm working on this week for a PhD program... And it's relevant to my daily life. The report is on " Flourishing in Ministry " and the factors associated with well-being for pastors working in a variety of church-based roles. I'm working part-time in a church this year, and my husband works in a church all the time, but even beyond that - there are some good reminders/insights for all of us who value well-being (which I think, hopefully, is all of us). -- Here's wha...

Journal entry, dated September 19, 2016 We are into the fall routine. It is full, and I worry about dropping the ball on so many little details, and yet in the evenings I flop on the couch, or the bed, or a chair. I stop working, I stop thinking. I hold my phone too close to my face. I check Twitter and Instagram, then Facebook. I cycle through. I play Candy Crush, use up my available lives, and check all the sites again while I wait for the next life to load. I am not proud of this. I read many interesting things online - recipes, life-hacks, personal essays, posts of people I admire from afar. I measure their lives against my own. Then, to make myself feel better about all the holes and gaps, I measure my life against the people I don't admire, the people who irk me, who have hurt me in the past - I keep them available for this purpose. It's a game in which we're all losers. --- I am not writing much these days. I am not journaling, I am not blogging, I am def...

5 Rules for Being a (North) American Adult (paraphrased from a lecture by Anne Lamott, whose priest friend shared them with her many years ago) 1. Have it all together. 2. If you don't have it all together, fix whatever is broken in you so that you do have it all together. 3. If you can't fix whatever's broken, pretend that you have. 4. If you can't pretend to be fixed, don't show up - it's a bit embarrassing to the rest of us. 5. If you do decide to show up broken, at least have the decency to be ashamed of yourself. -- We are encultured towards self-loathing and self-avoidance.  Be perfect. Do it all, do it right.  If you can't be better, pretend you are. Don't look any deeper. Keep busy. Keep your chin up. Keep up appearances. It takes so much energy. It takes too much energy. -- What would happen if I just loved myself? is the question I have been asking since my last post.   It's the question I ...

Some sins are more comfortable than others. (More comfortable to confess, at least.) William Carlos Williams’ poem, “This Is Just to Say,” is a quintessentially endearing confession: I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox and which you were probably saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold It’s not that hard to confess eating the plums. We sheepishly shrug our shoulders, offer a hug or a kiss, buy a few more plums for tomorrow, and move on. But it’s harder to confess the sins on my heart this week. Sins that are not only my own, but make others culpable too. Sins rooted in arrogance and self-centredness (okay, all sins are rooted there), sins that categorically look down on other people simply because they are not like me. I need to confess these sins because I don’t entirely know what to do with them. I need to confess these sins because they are almost ever-present in my life. I need to confess these sins because ev...

This post has been ten years in the making. It started when I graduated from my undergrad degree, and created this blog. I had just accepted my first full-time job. I was getting ready to move across the country. I bought my first cell phone. Twitter didn't exist. Facebook was just a baby. Now here I am, in 2016, about to graduate from my Masters degree. In the intervening decade, I have: Moved across the country, and then moved back east, to the largest city in our nation.  Held four different jobs - ministry, nanny, small business, college office.  Freelanced as a photographer, and as an editor/writer. Traveled to six different countries- three each in Europe and Africa. Lived in five different homes (#6 is two weeks away!).  Dated five men, and been on many other dates. Been a bridesmaid six times.  Celebrated other weddings, births, and joys.  Walked with loved ones through illness (physical and mental), death, infidelity, and other hear...

“Love is a waste of time.” The best possible waste – an extravagant gift with no guarantees. No measure of success and a great deal of risk. Love is a waste that we all want to have too much of running over flowing freely wasted on us. Love is a waste of time – but I still hope you waste your time on me. -- Today's Scripture readings include this story about a woman wasting a year's worth of perfume on the feet of Jesus.  It is one of three stories we have about this Mary. The other two are the death (and return to life) of her brother , and her refusal to leave the presence of Jesus to help her sister prepare dinner . I think that this trio of stories is worth looking at together. And I think that what we find here is a woman whose relationship with Jesus was characterized by intimacy, and that intimacy gave her a willingness to be judged by others, to let her love be seen as wasteful and extravagant. She defied societal norms. She gave sacrifi...

“Count the stars,” he told me. “This land will be yours,” he said. Outrageous! I thought. “How will I know?” I asked. I brought the sacrifice, slaughtered the animals, sat down, and waited. He didn’t warn me that after the promises, the obedience, and the waiting, the darkness would come. From Genesis 15 , the Old Testament lectionary reading for today. This is one of several passages in which God makes a covenant with Abram. What struck me in this particular instance is the strange, unsettling way in which God reiterates the covenant. What was Abram expecting; how did he think God would respond to his request for a sign or guarantee of the promise? Why did God put Abram to sleep and send a "terrifying darkness" after making these massive and intimate promises? And what does either of these questions have to do with us today?

This morning, I led a hospital ecumenical service, and gave a short message on  Luke 4:1-13  and its significance for those of us who are observing Lent.  I decided to post it here because I'm planning on sharing some Lenten poetry in the next few weeks, and I know that many of my readers are from Christian traditions that don't observe Lent, or from traditions that aren't exclusively Christian. I hope this helps set Lent into a specific context and a narrative - and I'm always happy to hear what doesn't make sense, or dialogue around any of the content. If you're unfamiliar with the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness, click on the link above so you can see what story I'm referencing! For many Christians around the world, we are now in the season of Lent. And when Christians talk about Lent, there are a few other words that are very often heard: wilderness fasting temptation preparation Each of these words is present in the Scripture story we...

Ashes and dust, we all fall down. These bodies of ours will fade away Til nothing is left but a smudge. The smallest trace of life. All our dreams and doings, Our hopes and hollering. One dirty smear for the eye to see And the invisible effects Of how we lived: The slaves we loosed The meals we shared The time we gave And the fullness of our grace.

It's ten pm. There's a pie in the oven. I made ginger snaps while the piemaker peeled and chopped. We chatted as we worked, and laughed, and kissed a few times. I'm putting together a pump-me-up playlist of lady-songs and trying not to stress about what I'm not getting done. Tomorrow I have homework to do - a whole semester to map out and plan for. And there is work-work to do too. I gave up one job so I could get through this last semester, but took on another theoretically smaller one. It's a good job, one I hope to carry on after graduation. It's been a long time since we've had a night like this, one where we've left the TV off, had the energy to do relaxing things, where I've thought, Maybe I'll write on the blog. -- I know we're closer to the end of January than the start, but I might say a thing or two about resolutions anyway. I don't make resolutions. Or rather, I don't like to broadcast my goals, and scienc...

It's the week after Christmas. NYE. The chaos has (mostly) died down, and we're all recuperating, right? This year, Christmas Day was quiet for us; gifts don't take long when there are only two of you. I made cinnamon buns, and then butternut squash soup. We missed (and then watched) the Queen's Christmas message, and a fascinating episode of The Nature of Things  about Stonehenge and its neolithic history. And then after dinner, I cried. Despite the near perfection of the day, especially its lack of busy-ness, I felt overwhelmed by life, by the reality of family expectations, by life change, and by my inability to pinpoint exactly what I "want" in life - especially in light of my nearly-complete Master's degree. "It just doesn't end," I cried, "I feel like it's all too much. Is this what the next 30 years will be like??" The next day I sat chatting with two quite delightful moms of young kids. Both readily admitt...

Once upon a time, I got into a very big fight with a friend. The kind of fight where bad words are said, and voices are raised, and tears are shed. We lived several provinces apart at the time, and since it was our only option, we skyped to try and resolve things. The first conversation ended in a stalemate, and we agreed to connect again in a week. At the beginning of the second call, we established something important; although her friends thought I was being a (w)itch and my friends thought she was being a baby, we were not willing to give up on our friendship. So we talked. Through the entire Super Bowl. And at the end, we still hadn't sorted things out.  I remember walking into the kitchen a little later, praying, "Jesus, if there is something I need to say or do that I haven't, show me what it is. Because I honestly don't know how to fix it." Then it hit me. So I sat down and emailed her. And she emailed me back. And it was over. The ne...

On Fridays, I don't go to school. And I don't go to work. I stay home. I still have work to do, but I do it at a desk in front of a big window, with a dog sleeping beside me. I listen to music (like Great Good Fine Ok ), I might bake, and I do laundry. Loads and loads of laundry. Sometimes I nap. I hang out with my housemates (dog and husband). This afternoon, we might go see a movie. Maybe we'll bike to the Distillery. Or grab lunch somewhere. Maybe we'll go watch the game at a pub, or maybe we'll stay home and try to survive the stress together. Any way I look at it, today is a gift. I have a full week next week, and this past one was full of job stress. I have had a cold for approximately 7 weeks (I am not even kidding you, folks). But today the sun is shining, and I'm allowed to say no to the things that are adding stress, and a resounding yes to the people and activities I love. Fridays are a gift, and sometimes they're a gift I turn down, l...

Earlier this month, I found an unpublished blog draft that is one line long. It reads: I give up my right to understanding . I don't know why I wrote it. I don't know what prompted it, or what it was that I thought I deserved to understand. But it struck me as still profoundly applicable to my life today. I want to understand everything. If it doesn't make sense, I don't accept it. If I can't wrap my head around it, I'm not okay with it. But what if. What if I gave up the assumption that I need to understand everything? What does it mean to trust something (or someone) I don't understand? What does it look like to stop demanding that explanations must fit my brain's way of working? --- Marriage is teaching me a bit about this. I'm often confused by this other person, the way they do things, their logic for decision-making, their assumptions and presuppositions. Sometimes, trying to understand him goes a long way in bridging whateve...

Throughout this series, I've been thinking about my friends who feel their families are in some way "incomplete." That is, the family they long for or once had or almost had is not their current reality. There's a loss, a lack, an absence that stays with them. This is true for almost all of us, in one way or another. Maybe an adult parent or sibling has died. Maybe there is estrangement that can't be overcome. Maybe we've experienced a miscarriage, stillbirth, or very early death. Maybe a divorce, or a widowing. Maybe there is simply the lack of a partner. We live in a world of loss, imperfection, and incompletion. We long for what we do not have. We grieve what we once held. This is not something we can remedy. But it is something we can give space for, something we can recognize and maybe assume, and treat gently.  -- I've loved the conversations that I have had both on and offline because of this series. Thank you all, once again, for particip...

When I wrote about the possibility of infertility, many of you said I was courageous for sharing my story. I'm grateful, and, as always, encouraged by your responses and kind words. But can I be honest? This topic is way more scary to me. It's scary because my fertility is something I have no control over - there is no shame for me in that, no regrets or if-onlys. But my choices about career-building are exactly that - choices. I have agency in these decisions, and that agency opens me up to errors, fear, judgment, and so much more. And where I stand - not quite a year into marriage, with two terms left in my masters degree, it's all a tangled bundle of thoughts and feelings and desires and uncertainty, and internal pressure, and offhand comments, and impossibility. It's impossible to do it perfectly. It's impossible to have everything I want. It's impossible to defend my decisions to the world. This creates a great deal of inner turmoil for me...

This post has taken me longer to write than I expected. I started, but it very quickly became a rant. It rambled; it griped; it wasn't something I was proud of. So I scrapped it and waited a few days, and here's what I've got now: I don't have a recipe for building the perfect family. I don't believe in how-to guides for life, or one-size-fits-all solutions. I'm quite opposed to the idea that such a thing could or  should  be possible. There are simply too many variables. There are too many stories. It's as simple as that. Build your family in the way that makes sense, fits your life. Invest in them. Love them. I know many of you are doing this, in a myriad of ways.... So. Based on the overwhelming kind response to my last post, and this firm belief that sharing our stories is one of the best ways we can help each other learn, I'd like to invite you to send me your stories around family, family-building, child-bearing, not-child-bearing, o...