Pen and Ink

I am an unreliable letter-writer. I left home for boarding school when I was 15, so letters to far away friends have been an obligation for more than half my life. I might write joyfully and frequently for a couple of years, and then something in my life changes and I don’t write anything. Since [...]

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The Saint

Classic Dredge for you today from June 2006. I was five years old, and full of awe for my grandfather. He loved me with an overflowing heart, claiming me for a grand-daughter when we were not blood kin. He was a farmer, with calloused, toughened hands, hands so tough he wiggled his fingers and let [...]

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The Sandman Cometh

I am asleep. Finally asleep. The iPod earbuds have fallen out, their cord somehow tangled loosely around my neck without strangling me. Then the baby wakes. It starts out small: grunts and squirms. Next come a series of short, abrupt “Wahs.” When Mother Milk Wench still has not arrived, she lets loose into full-scale caterwauling. [...]

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The Christian Smart Ass (or, Why Nobody Wants to Sit by Me in Heaven)

This post was originally published on June 30, 2006. It is all, sadly, still true. I used to belong to a book group at my old church. We read books of all sorts, and discussed how they did (or didn’t) relate to our Christian faith. One night – I don’t remember what book we were [...]

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In Memory of Lloyd Alexander

They were white, hardbound books with colorful pictures of swordsmen and horses on the cover. I still remember the corner of the elementary school library where I could find them. The Book of Three, The Black Cauldron, The Castle of Llyr, Taran Wanderer, and The High King – I met the hero in the first [...]

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