Category: Best of the Web

These people will make your life better.

1) For those of you within striking distance of Lancaster, one of my favorite bands, Jake Lewis and the Clergy, are playing a free concert at Binns Park. That’s right, free! Opening act is Atrain Xpress, and they start at 6pm, followed by Jake Lewis and the Clergy at 7pm. Check out their Facebook page HERE (and buy all the albums).

2) There are a ton of people on the Internet writing about writing, and half of them don’t know what they’re talking about. The other half are just regurgitating Anne Lamott or Natalie Goldberg. A handful are helpful writers with genuine contributions and unique insights into the writing life and process. One of these really helpful writers is Eric Wyatt. Check out his blog here: Words Matter.

3) A friend of mine, Preston Yancey, recently started a podcast. It’s on my listening list for today, and I can’t wait to hear what he has to say about “diverse topics within the Christian tradition and how they relate to everyday faith.” Check out his podcast here: Something Rather Than Nothing.

4) Finally, want to travel the world for free? Check out Tyler Stanton and Bryan Allain’s FREE eBook, “27 Tricks, Tips, and Busted Myths.” It’s all about travel hacking and how to trot the globe for no dollars. Get your copy HERE.

If you’d like to receive an update next week on my first novel (which I’m planning to release this winter through Kickstarter), take a second and subscribe to my email list in the right-hand column under the Refuse To Drown link.

“In the months since that night, I have not found many answers to my initial fears. I still don’t know where I fit, what I am to do, or how people will respond. This story is so precious to me that I initially held it close to protect it from being spoiled by the criticism and opinions of others.”

“But I realized that I’ve gone from hiding it to hiding from it… and from you.”

* * * * *

“I know where to go, rather than the pantry when I am lonely. I know how to breathe deep into the empty space inside me, that space that does not want calories but words and time and touch. I know how to bend my knee when I think that salt and sugar would surely suffice.”

* * * * *

“My marriage has instead brought out the best in me. I am stronger and more courageous. I am bolder. I am more loving. I am more of who I was meant to be because of the way that tall Nebraskan has loved me well. And I believe that I have done the same for him. It’s been fifteen years since we fell in love, thirteen since we were married: our marriage and our family works because we submit to one another.”

* * * * *

“I’m not calling that way of doing life wrong, but life isn’t One Size Fits All, and the breathless hurry isn’t for our family.”

* * * * *

“It’s just a regular Monday. The world over are strings and tambourines. Rivers turn solid ground beneath beasts. Flowers bloom and dance. Dew flashes, and snowflakes form uniquely, altogether new, by the millions of billions. We are new creations all the time.  Our faith isn’t yet supposed to be made to be sight.”

And I asked him a bit about the size of the community he’s in. “Twenty-five families,” he said. I asked how many youth they had, and at what age they usually joined the church. “We have about twenty youth,” he said. “And they usually join when they’re twelve or thirteen years old or so.” That’s a lot of pressure, there, to join at that age, I thought. That’s how they rope them in. I didn’t say that, though.

And we just kept chatting.

* * * * *

Maybe I understand why I explode into each home I’ve lived in.  Part of me wants it all to look like we’ve been here a while, like we’re going to make lots of memories here.  I want it to look and feel rooted.  Because flying is tiring and sometimes you just want to sink into the good dirt and stay awhile.

* * * * *

Just a little bit more please. A little more money. More house. More shoes. A few more blog subscribers and Facebook fans and Twitter followers.  More please, I’m almost but not quite satisfied, thank you very much.

* * * * *

This year will look so much like all the other ones…and also nothing like the other ones, but for all my resolutions, I can’t make anything new. All I can do is behold. Watch. Wait.

* * * * *

I worked the problem to find my answer, but when my answer didn’t show up in the list or possible options, I picked the closest alternative. Writing teacher was so much easier for me to conceptualize than professional writer.

I didn’t know how to achieve my plan A, so I accepted plan B instead.

* * * * *

That’s what I do now. No parties, no alcohol, no whooping and hollering. Come midnight on the first, I take a walk outside. I look at the stars and I breathe deep, and I ready myself for one more trip through the calendar. Did it this January first, too. I could hear the neighbors celebrating. I wished them well.

* * * * *

because there are somethings that are more important than the ideology i surround myself with, the ways i try to present myself to the world. my life is not about downward mobility, or loving my neighbors, or working and living with the urban poor.

my life is about being obedient, which is all so much harder than that.

I’ve played the waiting game. Looking for a job, waiting out a rough one. Trying to connect, to put down roots that take. Some days parenting is an exercise in being fully present, in not just waiting for second shift when Dad tags in, bedtime, or tomorrow’s new mercies, sweet Jesus, please.

* * * * *

More real than rankings or refund numbers. More real than sales or royalty reports.  The people – the ones in the pages, the ones who walked this earth before me, the ones who read – they are my focus.  Always.

* * * * *

It’s enough to make you scream and shout and weep and fall apart, and if you do, I want you to know, it’s okay. Everyone wants to act like the holidays are the time to have our ish together, all charming and cheerful like a freaking Norman Rockwell, but we all know it’s never really like that, even on our best days, right?

* * * * *

I wasn’t really alone during that time in my life—I had my daughters, at least most of the time. And most of the time I didn’t feel lonely, even when I was actually alone. But at dusk, in December, there was a weight of melancholy that pressed on my chest, spreading through me in a thick, slow ache.

* * * * *

God is a midwife to His laboring world. He holds us, reminding us to breathe, He props us up and leans in to keep us from sinking. We bare down, push too hard and He whispers quiet, but firm, “s l o w–breathe“.

* * * * *

What’s the best blog post you read recently?