Last night, while Dad held Han, something became clear: the longing between father and son had always traveled both ways. Today, as we prepare to meet a therapist, we are learning that asking for help does not mean becoming less of a family. Maybe it means learning how to live more fully as the family we already are.
Category Archives: Ordinary Life
Give Us This Day
How much does Proverb have to signal before Dad trusts what he already knows with his heart? On a day filled with fear about therapy, money, work and the future, we discover that we are allowed to ask God for what we need—and that agency may begin with one small thing that belongs to this day.
Are You Okay Over There?
On Justus’s Day, we help bring water to people living in encampments beneath an Oakland freeway and come home carrying more questions than answers. What does it mean for our children to contribute to our family without becoming responsible for it? What does it mean for Dad to protect his sons without promising that nothing frightening will ever happen? Maybe the answer begins with being here, trying to listen, keeping our promises, and letting Justus be eleven.
What Does God Want Us to Build?
Yesterday we asked, “Under what conditions can we act?” Today, on Han’s Day, we find ourselves asking what comes next: What do we carry across the bridge from the life we had, what do we leave behind, and how do we discern what God wants us to build?
The Mailbox
For most of our life, people have looked at the extraordinary things we could do and the ordinary things we could not do and asked, “If you can do that, why can’t you do this?” Today, a trip to the mailbox helped our plural family of nine begin asking a different question: Under what conditions can we act?
You Get to Be Seven
A seven-year-old goes quiet. Daddy realizes that love has accidentally become a burden. A day of memories, friendship, repair, and the unseen work of a plural family becomes a lesson in what it means to let a child be seven.
More Daniel
Daniel has always been Daniel, whether anyone recognized him or not. As our five-year-old son learns to say no, express anger, and tell us what he wants, the rest of us are learning something too: how to create a family in which he never has to become loud in order to matter.
It Smells Like Home
What is it like when an adult and eight children share a body, mind, inner world, memories, relationships, trauma, and an ordinary life? Sometimes the questions are enormous. Sometimes being Dad means admitting you need help. And sometimes it means chopping an onion and making dinner.
Your Children Are Your Life
A trip to Hayward becomes something more than a meeting: a family moves toward an uncertain future without leaving anyone behind. There is BART, peanut butter and jelly, grace, a new Vincentian home, time together afterward—and a friend who understands something essential: “Your children are your life.”
If We Cried Today, It Was Over the Red Onion
A therapist said they couldn’t work with us, and fear rushed to fill the blank space. On Hope’s Day, we returned to a principle our family knows well: err on the side of life. We called our children by name, kept Daddy’s appointment with his sons, ate cucumber sandwiches, and let tomorrow’s Greek salad marinate.
