My friend who shares my name, Bethany Rose, called me last Tuesday morning from somewhere up in Minnesota, where she was bundled and walking her Great Pyrenees named Shiloh. “We’re experiencing a warm front,” she said. “It’s twenty-five degrees today.” I was planting a tray of lettuce on my patio in Missouri, because we were … Continue reading The Long Winter
Folks say I take after my mom’s side of the family— that I have the Latham nose and smile. But Dad and I are alike in a lot of ways too, though they tend to be unseen things, like tendencies. For one, Dad and I both crave a good, stretching view of the horizon. Since … Continue reading The Hill
I looked for something that could fill me in 2021, but I came away with a handful of air more times than I care to recount, because as it turns out, I was looking in the wrong places. The answer, of course, was that Jesus should satisfy me, ultimately and deeply, like an everlasting draught … Continue reading A Handful
By Hannah Mead “I am coming,” He whispers, with cypress smoke and cinnamon. I’m waiting, straw clutched between cold fingers pushed through impatient pockets. But tonight, the promise of dawn lingers heavy below the horizon. Perhaps Venus is pinned like a diamond in the darkness behind the shed that tilts, weary, at the bottom of … Continue reading Advent
Someone gave me a composition notebook for my fourteenth birthday and told me to write blessings in it, to number them. I think the goal was 10,000, but I lost count after awhile, and the “thanksgivings” turned into little observations of the world around me: The house is quiet this morning. Elsie learned to roll … Continue reading The Things I’ve Seen
"Thank an artist today," someone said on Instagram last week, and I happened to be walking through the booths at the entrance to Silver Dollar City--- little closets of handmade brooms and paintings and pottery and baskets and woven rugs. The makers of each were dressed in their aprons and smocks, watching us and waiting. … Continue reading Thank the Artist
“Well, do you think spring has sprung?” he asks, and I look up to see things from his view. His yard is a patchwork of green and yellow, the trees at the crest of Edgewood are leafless, two brand new tulips stand awkward and alone off his front porch. “I—I think it has. I hope … Continue reading Is Springing
It’s that time of year when I go hunting for spring, checking every corner for it the way Frog and Toad did in their Adventures. We have a patch of early bulb shoots, but our yard stands blank compared to Papa Larry’s. I worked in his front gardens yesterday afternoon, straightening up soil fencing with … Continue reading Destined to Rise
Not even my parents can remember a blizzard like last week’s— when we shoveled half a foot of snow off the pond just so we could skate, while the wind reddened our faces and froze our hair. More snow covered our work in minutes. The sky cleared on Wednesday, so now it’s sun on ice— … Continue reading Winters Past & Present
January 19 If you don’t think the world is magical or that God doesn’t spin whimsy things, try buttoning your coat and traipsing out into heel-deep snow when somewhere behind stacks of clouds the sun is almost gone. Make sure the sky is spilling flakes. Forget gloves, forget a cap. If you stomp around … Continue reading How to be Awed by a Magical World
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