Selfishness

“You are being selfish.” That was something I heard said to me recently when I set a boundary. I was expected by someone to do something I didn’t want to do, and when I chose not to do it and even offered them a compromise, they lashed out and said I was a bad person […]

Taylor Swift and the Sower

I am not a Swiftie in any form. I have listened to her tracks when they come across my streaming feeds or are on the radio at work. I like a few of her songs, but I can’t say I am as fanatical as some. I also am not dissing her in any way, because […]

An Eclipse and a Basketball Game

The past couple of weeks there have been two major events in my little swath of the Midwest, both of which brought many together in unity. The first one was the women’s NCAA basketball tournament, when the University of Iowa team went all the way to the championship game. And while Caitlin Clark and the […]

What sound does hope make when it dies?

Does anyone else remember those “magic eye” books and posters? The ones that, if you stared long enough or used a certain position to view it, you could see whatever picture was hidden behind the abstract design. They were quite popular when I was younger. Can I let you in on a secret? Though sometimes […]

Changing the belief to live the story

This past Sunday was Easter, the celebration of the resurrection of the Christian Lord. As a storyteller, I have always been fascinated with how the story on Saturday played out. On Friday, the hope that Jesus’ followers and disciples had was dead. Grief was heavy. A story that they had hoped would be everlasting had […]

Rabble-Rouser

For most of the Christian world, we are in the midst of what is known as Holy Week. It is the week that begins with Palm Sunday and culminates with Easter. It commemorates the last week in the life of Jesus. But the Holy Week depicted in the Bible wasn’t a celebration. It was a […]

Beautiful messes

Many of us have been called labels instead of names. Self-centered. Narcissist. Radical. Socialist. Sinner. Dumb ass. Stupid. Selfish. Crazy. We carry these labels, shouldering them alongside the weight of all that we are, all that we need to do, all that we have to be. Sometimes, we carry so much weight and have so […]

Love thine enemy

It is super hard to be nice to people who are mean to us. Ask any person who works in customer service or retail and they will tell you so, since they are expected to be friendly even as anger and vitriol and snide comments are thrown their way. Between the entitlement stories and the […]

Blessed are….

In my fantastical adventurous Portals Series, there is an enemy to magic. It is not dark magic, for even sorcery has a place in my fictionalized world of portals and realms even as some look down their nose at it. It is rather an ideal, an entity called evil. Evil is twisted, created from the […]