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Notes from the Road: Conversations That Exasperate My Wife
by Ben DeVries | Jul 18, 2022 | Placeless
I don’t see what the big deal is.
Crap Wildlife Photography: A Fluff Piece
by Laura Sheppard Song | Jul 17, 2022 | Placeless
Crap Wildlife Photography is a great equalizer.
Join Something; Don’t Apologize
by Katie Van Zanen | Jul 16, 2022 | Placeless
We need one another in order to be brave.
Holding the Metaphor Lightly
by Courtney Zonnefeld | Jul 15, 2022 | Washington, D.C.
Metaphors are tools for meaning-making, and when those tools have harvested bushel after bushel of meaning for my life, of course I struggle to see them as incomplete, limiting, or dangerous.
Memory Lane
by Olivia Harre | Jul 13, 2022 | Placeless
People said I glided across the water, but I felt more like I was floundering, barely able to get above the surface long enough to gasp for air.
Ad-in
by Klaas Walhout | Jul 12, 2022 | Placeless
My grippy polyester strings bite deep into the fuzz, sending it on an arc toward the far side of the service box.
Running Off the Side of a Mountain
by Lauren Cole | Jul 11, 2022 | France
My hesitation caused the exact outcome I’d feared.
I Was Wrong About: Myself
by Philip Rienstra | Jul 10, 2022 | Placeless
Lines like “If their identity is based on feelings, and their feelings are always changing, then their identity is always changing”, though embarrassing, gave me this sweet sense of self-revelation that made me feel relieved and enlightened all at the same time.
Wild Food on Easy Mode
by Gwyneth Findlay | Jul 9, 2022 | Placeless
These plants simply grow, unimpeded, in ways that suit people and creatures alike.
Monky Business
by Josh Parks | Jul 8, 2022 | Germany
I watch over my friend’s shoulder as they make mistakes and then correct them, reassured somehow that typos aren’t just a modern malady.
Ode to Subway
by Susannah Boersma | Jul 7, 2022 | New York
Subway is a communion of scattered purposes.
Some Questions to Which I Don’t Have Adequate Answers and Probably Never Will
by Ben Orlebeke | Jul 6, 2022 | Placeless
Is there an instinctive shock response that would incapacitate any medieval monk who went on YouTube?
Where We Will Land
by Alex Johnson | Jul 5, 2022 | Placeless
I never thought I would entrench myself deep enough anywhere to forge friendships with people who I don’t want to know my real name or face and whose lives I only have the slightest inkling of.
My Life, in Screenshots
by Comfort Sampong | Jul 4, 2022 | Placeless
I was privately affirming truths, moments I felt seen by someone who spoke the words of my heart, and serendipitous findings.
My Childhood Palate
by Ansley Kelly | Jul 3, 2022 | Placeless
On other nights, Dad would come out to campfires we were so fond of building, cracking open a big can of baked beans to nestle into the coals on the edge of the pit.
Oops I’m a Troubadour
by Christina Ribbens | Jul 2, 2022 | Placeless
It’s a pitiful, endearing, and slightly Dickensian image: two pale, scrawny siblings with oversized guitar cases strapped to their backs, walking slowly along a quiet street.
When Your Vagina Doesn’t Work—and You’re Married
by Anonymous | Jun 30, 2022 | Placeless
Miracles are rare and precious, and the one I’ve begged and pleaded and soaked my pillow with tears and snot for hasn’t come in nearly three years—and counting.
The Non-Reproductive Church
by Jack Kamps | Jun 29, 2022 | Placeless
What if there is something more important than the church’s survival?
Cohabitating My Way to Hell
by Jon Gorter | Jun 28, 2022 | Michigan
My friend had just described a hypothetical scenario of someone living in direct opposition to the laws of the church, and there I was, right beside him, living that life, deserving of reprimand.
One Body Dysmorphic
by Anna Jeffries | Jun 27, 2022 | Placeless
You sit inside the dedicated four walls that purportedly house the holy body, but your own body feels bad because you’ve been led to believe you can’t feel anything else.
Sacrificing My Soul on the Altar of Gay Porn
by Annaka Koster | Jun 26, 2022 | Placeless
As a woman, I was late to the scene, and as a hopelessly asexual person, the scene did nothing for me.
The Center is Not Here
by Natasha (Strydhorst) Unsworth | Jun 25, 2022 | Placeless
We can be lamentably blind to the blood on our hands
Sex Ed and More with the Saints
by Joshua Polanski | Jun 24, 2022 | Placeless
Lesson learned: don’t castrate yourself for God or all of your friends might find out.
“Can Guys and Girls Be Friends?”
by Mitchell Barbee | Jun 23, 2022 | Placeless
When I first heard of the Billy Graham Rule as a teenager, it sounded commendable.
The Patron Saint of Sexually Unfulfilled Women
by Kayleigh (Fongers) Van Wyk | Jun 22, 2022 | Placeless
She never condemns or criticizes anyone for their own unique experiences.
Jesus Swipe!
by Emily Joy Stroble | Jun 21, 2022 | Placeless
My experience on Upward has largely been a strange dance—two people wobbling with Jesus awkwardly in the middle.
Mine Is the Easy Job
by Lillie Spackman | Jun 19, 2022 | Placeless
All I must do is mourn with those who mourn, offer my voice to those who can’t find the words, condemn hate and harm.
Tone, Not Substance
by Ben DeVries | Jun 18, 2022 | Placeless
The denomination would like for things to be settled.
A Sex Education
by Laura Sheppard Song | Jun 17, 2022 | Placeless
We get married. We have sex. The world doesn’t feel different once it happens.
Thank You, Neland Avenue
by Katie Van Zanen | Jun 16, 2022 | Grand Rapids
I am grateful to be a daughter of Neland Avenue Christian Reformed Church because it matters still, to see so many people who care about the things that so deeply trouble me in the world and in the church.
