April 2014
Virginia's Democratic Governor Terry McAuliffe recently signed two bills into law that provide rules for licensing genetic counselors. Genetic counseling has been recognized as a field since the late 1970s, but many states still fail to regulate it. With advances in technology ...
My daughter Eden is slow. I know that sounds negative. It feels almost like a betrayal to write it. Our world rarely welcomes slowness. But Eden, who is nine years old and has Down syndrome, remains unaware of the need to rush. Ever.
This morning she walked out of the house ...
I started teaching a memoir class in our local library last week. I've never done a class like this before, and the local program coordinator said she hoped for about twenty people from our town of 3,000. Forty-five people showed up, from age ten to eighty-five.
Apparently ...
What do you do before you go to sleep?
I remember when I was in my first job out of college, and after about two years of working until the time I rolled into bed, I started reading novels again. Just as I had as a kid, before novels became homework assignments for all ...
I'm honored to have Caryn Rivadeneira here today to talk about her newly released book, Broke: What Financial Desperation Revealed About God's Abundance. I'll be hosting a giveaway of Caryn's book on my Facebook page if you'd like a chance to read it for ...
"Good morning, sweetie peetie," I greet Temma each morning, my own eyes still half-shut when I paddle into her room. Her eyes are most often open as if she has been waiting for me. She startles a bit at the sound of my voice, her arms and feet lifting up and her ...
It was a long week.
Penny, my eight-year old daughter, was on spring break. William (5) and Marilee (3) were not. My husband Peter was out of town. So I decided to pull William and Marilee from school and go to the Connecticut shore, where we have a family beach house. ...
Last week I returned from the Festival of Faith and Writing, a conference that is just what it sounds like, populated by writers and readers and people of faith. For people like me this constitutes a taste of heaven. Being at the Festival gave me a chance to think about why ...
Just before Jesus died, according to Matthew and Mark, he cried out in a loud voice, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" It's a question that has rung out ever since, as Jesus' followers continue to wonder exactly why he uttered this "cry of ...
So much pain. I was at what should have been the prime of life. Med school finished, internship and residency done. Two kids and a wonderful wife at home. But there was so much pain.
I was a rheumatologist practicing in Roanoke, Virginia when I began to have discomfort ...
I'm starting to feel like an old lady. I shook my head at Miley Cyrus at the MTV Music Awards and at Beyonce's performance for the 2013 Super Bowl halftime show. I went out for a drink with friends on my 37th birthday, and we talked for an hour about how to protect ...
I'm in Grand Rapids at the Festival of Faith and Writing as I write, and my head is swimming with new books to read and new ideas to consider, and that's only after hearing four speakers/panels on the first day. But it strikes me that I ought to talk about books today ...
It's been six years since the beginning of the Great Recession. Six years of conversations about unemployment, underemployment, mortgage-backed securities, and millions of Americans who have seen their fortunes fall. Six years of bemoaning Wall Street. Six years of reports ...
Repent sounds like such a religious word, like street preachers shouting, like moralists wagging fingers. But I learned a long time ago that the literal translation of "repent" is to turn around. "Hey, buddy, you're headed in the wrong direction"—that ...
"If people in your community are going to Wal-Mart in their wheelchairs but not coming to your church, a lot of times the church community calls them shut-ins. They're not shut-ins; they're just shut out of the church" (Ned Stoller (cited in Making Churches ...
May 2014
