P&S Oct 2021 GIFT

.........................................................6 .......................................................36 ........................................................... 46 ............................................................54 .......................................................62 Click on the section to jump to it

Elrena Evans

Happy October, friends!

I

n Pennsylvania, October is when I begin to believe that fall still exists, that the seasons will change, that cooler weather will indeed come again. I’m still pulling out my sweaters longingly, thinking about warm fires and snuggling with my children on chilly evenings, before sighing and putting on yet another tank top… but there is promise in the air, in the early mornings and late at night, promise that I am holding on to as surely as my fall sweaters.

I just finished reading American Baby: A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption by Gabrielle Glaser, and I found it both interesting and desperately sad.

As a former foster child myself, I’m always interested in the complex and nuanced

stories of how we parent and create families.

Toward the end of the book, one woman notes, “The tragedy in someone else’s family becomes the joy, the life, for another.” And it made me think about how often tragedy and joy walk together, hand in hand.

The theme for the October issue of Paper&String is juxtaposition.

I think we tend to think about fall in terms of harvest and bounty… but often we experience fall as a fallow season, too. So much of our life is juxtaposition: Joy with sorrow. Hope with despair. Death with new life. Beauty with pain.

This month we have Lisa-Jo writing another review for us, Christie writing on front door gardens, and Tonya serving up something scrumptious. We’re also welcoming Shawn Smucker back to the pages of Paper&String, writing about death and life in juxtaposition.

When I first read Shawn’s essay, I wrote to him and said that his piece caught inside of me somewhere, like the muezzins he writes of in his piece. I hope it catches inside of you, too. And I hope in all the juxtapositions of these pages this month, you find something that brings you joy.

When The Seeds Fall

by Shawn Smucker

A

s far as friendships go, it wasn’t a long one—Stan died a few months after we first met. He had received a terminal diagnosis, so the organization he worked with hired me to travel halfway around the world, interview him, and write his memoir.

The place we spent those three weeks together was unique: Istanbul, Turkey, the 100-mile-wide city. Its muezzins called the city’s faithful to prayer five times a day, their piercing voices echoing through the streets, stopping nearly everyone in their tracks. The faithful took out their prayer mats and began their salats, their cycles of prayer movement, wherever they were—on the bus, on the sidewalk, inside a restaurant. “Allahu Akbar,” they begin.

God is great.

The sound of the muezzins caught inside of me somewhere, and I lay awake at night, listening to that one final call after the sun had set, wondering where all the prayers in the world were going.

The streets of Istanbul “Unless a seed falls to are the opposite of the ground and dies, a grid system. Each it remains a single meandering way seed. But if it dies, it seems to accidentally produces many seeds.” intersect with other streets, and the angles of their crossings are more confusing than ordered. Every day of my time there, a taxi driver would take me on a one-hour drive from the room where I was staying to Stan’s apartment, and I don’t think that any two drivers ever chose the same route. Which is a perfect metaphor: there are a million ways to each of our own arrivals.

But it isn’t the city itself I remember most about those three weeks at the bedside of a dying man. What comes back to me first is a set of words Stan said nearly every single day that we met, a short phrase from the book of John: “Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it remains a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” He would say these words with conviction, working it into the story of his life. I listened. I took notes. I found his pending death drawing me down into a new kind of sadness; after all, he was only 50, with a beautiful wife and two children. None of it made any sense to me at the time.

Stan’s voice and body were tired. He would sit back on his floor-level couch and stare out the window, out past the minarets and the tall apartment buildings, and he would take a deep breath, and he would say the words again.

“Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it remains a single seed…”

Stan knew he didn’t have long, but he also knew that his death would, somehow, be a gift to others. This was a juxtaposition I found difficult to accept at the time.

••• I’m thinking of Stan this morning as steady rain falls from a gray, overcast sky on the first day of autumn, my favorite season. Fall has always been a precious time to me, with its chilly nights, darkening evenings, and Ferris wheel lights off in the distance as our local fairs come and go.

“Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it remains a single seed…”

In my mind, the life cycle’s order of events has been set for a long time: spring, summer, fall, winter. Perhaps I have my country childhood among farmers to thank for this. Plant a seed, watch it grow, collect the harvest, and then manage to get through the fallow season until spring comes back around in all of its glory.

And while this matches the farmer’s schedule, this is not always how things play out in real life, is it? How often have you planted a seed of hope or creativity only to wait and wait and wait, watching the ground for any sign of life, and then, when nothing appears, tried to manage the disappointment, heartache, or loss?

The thing is, in nature, seeds aren’t always planted in the spring. Some seeds are dropped in the fall, leaving a long, empty season between Maybe the seeds the planting and the first we have planted signs of growth.

are autumn seeds Maybe this is a more that require a accurate picture of what long, fallow season life is like. Maybe some of before they can us are planting autumn begin to grow. seeds, the kind of seeds that will not begin sprouting in a few days or weeks, but the kind of seeds that need to weather a desolate season in order to grow.

•••

Which brings us to my favorite tree, a tree designed to die a fiery death.

When my family and I visited Yellowstone, we marveled at the thick growth of these incredibly straight trees. They were everywhere, but it wasn’t until we saw them growing in an area that had recently experienced a wildfire that I did a little research and discovered the name of this evergreen: the lodgepole pine.

The lodgepole pine can drop thousands of cones in a single growing season, and each pinecone contains the seeds that will grow the next generation of lodgepole pines. Except there is a catch: the vast majority of these cones are held together by a resin that can only be opened in a forest-devastating wildfire. It is only in the heat of a wildfire that these cones are pried open and their seeds spilled into the earth.

“Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it remains a single seed…”

Unless a pinecone falls to the ground and is consumed by wildfire.

Unless a dream is planted.

Unless our circumstances consume us.

Maybe the seeds we have planted are autumn seeds that require a long, fallow season before they can begin to grow.

Or maybe our life has been devastated, as if by a wildfire, and we don’t recognize the ways the heat and pressure have

released tiny seeds that will someday grow into something we cannot even imagine. Seeds that are only now beginning to lodge into the earth, seeds that will remake an entire wilderness.

This, I think, is the uncelebrated beauty of fall: that we can plant seeds when we are at our lowest point. That sometimes, we can plant seeds without even knowing it.

I’ve spent years raving to friends about the books, shows, and films I love and why. They don’t have to be recent to catch my eye.

They only have to be a new way to see the old, old story of light vs. dark.

This never fails to move me.

While not every review will be for every person, my hope is that these move you too.

Skater Girl Where You Can Find It: Netflix Rating: PG What You Need To Know: I watched this with my ten-year-old daughter and by the end we were both cry-cheering and hugging each other. And throughout the entire film, we kept pausing to have interesting and curious conversations about culture, what it means to be a girl, and what we take for granted in our own family lives. And yes, this film is exactly what you’re thinking—it’s about a young Indian girl who gets her first skateboard, and her family and village aren’t nearly as keen as your kids will be. And yes! She wins everyone over! And no part of this story was trite, patronizing or oversentimentalized.

L

isten, gather ye little chickens (well, I’d stick with the tween and up chickens) and watch this glorious foreign language film experience.

It’s in both Hindi and English, but the first 40 minutes or so are just Hindi with subtitles and I loved having a way to introduce “I know a girl who says my youngest to that when she skates, she international feels free. For the first time storytelling.

she’s allowed herself to dream, and that inspires me.”

I had no idea that skateboarding - Skater Girl had taken India by storm, but the filmmakers interviewed hundreds of young skater girls as part of their research. It’s their cumulative stories that are represented by the young

heroine, 16-year-old Prena (Rachel Saanchita Gupta), who gets a taste of freedom through skateboarding. An expat British-Indian, Jessica (Amy Maghera), returns to her roots and (literally) bumps into Prena, and will eventually crash into parental expectations, village elders, and politicians through the act of giving the kids access to a board and four polyurethane wheels.

This is a story about women, told by women, and we get to see through the eyes of a wide range of Indian caste experiences. It is not an easy story, which is why I think it rang true to my ten-year-old. Kids know that life can be much rougher than Disney would have us believe, and Prena’s challenges with her father, her teacher, and the marriage arranged for her will open up a rich dialogue you can have with your kids.

In a world more and more divided, who knew that a skateboard could cross language barriers and offer fresh points of connection and empowerment for girls?! As an added bonus it was sweet to learn that the skate park built for the movie still stands in the remote Indian village where it is used daily by its young residents.

It’s also worth mentioning that while the filmmakers based the story on a wide crosssection of skater girls interviewed in India, there is a claim that the story might actually have originated with a German national who’d set up a skate park that radically changed the

life of a tribal girl, Asha Gond from Janwaar in Panna, Madhya Pradesh in 2015. There is certainly an intersection of these stories in the movie that rings with a rich sound of truth.

This is a coming-of-age story both achingly familiar and hauntingly unique. I wish for more movies like this for our kids.

with ANNA GRIST

Self-Care Is Not A Dirty Word

T

here’s one phrase that has kept repeating itself to me from various angles this year, and it’s one I thought I understood better than I’m finding I actually do: Self-care. If you grew up in a conservative space like I did, self-care was a new age, woo-woo, selfish term, and was assumed it would fly in the face of virtuous things like self-sacrifice and loving others.

The more I grasp the true meaning and intent of this phrase, however, the more I realize that there is no way to truly live sacrificially and sacramentally unless you are making sure to live out the “love yourself” portion of the call to “love others as you love yourself.” It’s subtle, but it’s there. The biblical equivalent of “Put on your own oxygen mask first,” because, quite frankly, we can’t help anyone if we’re unconscious.

True self-care that is maintainable and consistent doesn’t necessarily include escape or retreat, though both can be excellent tools. Caring for your soul is inward and introspective; it involves looking deeply inward and not forgetting what you saw ( James 1:23).

It means finding out what gives you life and what drains that life from you, and finding the balance and being intentional about how much you say yes.

There are a lot of ways to practice self-care, and I think perhaps the first step is sitting down and taking the time to ask your mind, your soul, and your body what it is it needs regularly that it’s not getting. Where do you carry shame in your mind?

Where does tension live in your body? What idea doesn’t sit right in your soul? And, more importantly: What good things are you craving that fill up your soul through your senses, your mind, your body?

I’ll share a few things recently that I’ve learned I need to add to my life, and also some I’ve had to take away, in hopes that you, too, will begin to think about what it is your whole self and the Holy Spirit inside you are saying you need to function. So that your mind, body and soul can do the things God has called you and given you a desire to do.

I’ve added moving my body regularly, whether it’s a walk, hike, bike, kayak, yoga session, or something else, gentle or challenging. This is something I struggle to believe is worth the effort. My brain has tried to trick me into thinking it will take my energy instead of giving it back. But while it may tire my body, it always gives my mind and soul a boost. And I’ve learned how to adjust for my body, to listen to what it needs on that given day, and not push too hard. I’ve proven that moving my body can move stress through (and out of) my body and mind, and also move my mind to conclusions and resolution of things spinning inside my head.

I’ve taken away letting shame win fights in my head. Guilt lets us know there’s something off in something we’ve said or done so that we can be aware and ready to pivot.

Shame keeps beating us up for being human and not being able to stop ourselves from making mistakes in the first place. Shame says we need to keep feeling bad even when we’ve identified the problem and are working towards a change.

Shame is never satisfied until we are retroactively, and currently, and forever in our future: perfect. Shame will never be satisfied, it will always paralyze and destroy and isolate and completely wreck our ability to let God do anything about the thing we’re so shamed about in the first place. The antidote? For me, it’s sharing it with a safe friend who can relate or give me the grace I can’t give myself.

It’s remembering that God loved me before I was redeemed and does not clean me up before He embraces me, and knows exactly how flawed I am and is not worried about it. It’s forgiving myself before I feel like it, and offering myself the same grace I’d give someone else. It’s also having a therapist remind me when I’m being mean to myself and asking more of myself than is humanly possible.

Self-care has meant asking myself what I really enjoy doing, and making it a regular priority, on par with the care I offer other people.

This includes knowing how to set boundaries of whom I will

help and make time for, and training myself to know when I can and should say no and let someone else fill that need. It means releasing the shame I feel that I won’t give until I bleed.

And trusting that God can fill needs through other people if I reach my human capacity to offer more.

Jesus went away to sleep. He didn’t heal people 24/7. He spent a third of his time very humanly resting so He could do His Father’s business. He took time to eat with friends. To go on spiritual prayer mini-retreats. So how dare I think I need less than my Savior did in order to be equipped to fulfill my calling and my responsibilities?

Self-care is very individual, and it’s not meant to be a set rule or something you “fail” at if you don’t do it regularly. It’s a gift to be given to yourself that matches what you need and can realistically be added into your life. I would highly recommend Rebekah Lyons’ book Rhythms of Renewal, as well as Glennon Doyle’s podcast episode on Self-Care (and also her episode on Addiction, which complemented it).

And of course all these are just tools which are meant to point us back to true rest in Jesus, in whom “we live, and move, and have our being;” and ever invite us to “come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you

rest.” This is where selfcare starts: A deep breath, a moment to stop, to rest, reflect and gently ask our own selves, “How can I love you the way that Jesus loves you, so that we know how to love Him and others, too?”

In Our Earbuds: Dark Thoughts

By Jon Carlson

T

his episode of the podcast Invisibilia Click here to is about thoughts, listen to the and particularly podcast about challenging the Freudian received wisdom that “all thoughts have meaning.”

The episode explores someone who essentially needs to undergo exposure therapy— an extreme version of cognitive behavioral therapy—for his own thoughts.

Poetry: Juxtaposition

by Leslie Bustard

The Way Things Are I. Cancer hides in the dark—billeted inside me.

If not dealt with, tumors will wreak havoc in unknown places around my body.

Its shadows lay siege to future hopes.

2.

The other day, as I turned onto Barley Mill Road, I caught a glimpse of a single tiny ash leaf.

Its yellow glow skimmed the surface of a breeze In that moment I wished it knew the delight of playing in the sunshine.

3.

And each day this week I have watched a monarch with orange wings wing its way around a butterfly bush.

It hovers over a random white flower and then flies over my vined-covered fence.

It looks quite happy in its freedom.

4.

The flowering morning glories and buzzing cicadas, the floating yellow leaves, the prancing butterflies, the quick flight of swallows in the early night sky, and Jesus— like the ray of light streaming through greenfilled branches— I want this life in me.

Click on the video images OR the poem titles to enjoy a reading of each poem!

The Sense of Hope (for Shawn and Maile) How your bare feet feel on soft grass, the hard ground underneath; Those sweet juices of an orange filling your mouth; That tenor note halfway through Lux Æterna that always makes your heart yearn; But also the heavy morning mist before the sun opens up the curve in the road.

Hope is now the long wait, Holding onto the one unseen who still sees.

The Bird Out My Window “as hawks rest upon air, and the air sustains them…”

- Denise Levertov I keep returning in my mind to a bird I saw yesterday.

She sat still on the top-most branch of a nearby tree made leaf–empty by a late Autumn rain.

Of all places to perch, this bird chose the thinnest, loneliest twig.

With no other birds nearby, she tightly held her own against a white sky.

Her weight, or a slight breeze, caused the branch to sway.

With a tilt of her small head and a ruffle of feathers, the bird looked side to side, content, so far away from solid ground.

I keep wondering— Is this what it’s like to be a sparrow in God’s eyes . . . peacefully perched up high, confident that letting go will not result in a free-fall?

I recall looking away for a moment, and then she was gone.

Leslie Bustard lives in a century old row house in Lancaster City, PA where she and her husband raised their three daughters. A lover of people, words, and art, she enjoys gathering people around her kitchen table, reading, writing, rambling outside, and museum-ing. For many years she was a homeschooling mama, a teacher of literature and writing, and a producer of high school and children’s theater; now she is a contributing writer for The Cultivating Project. Leslie is editing a book of essays about children’s literature called Wild Things and Castles in the Sky: A Guide to Choosing the Best Books for Children. Her website is Poetic Underpinnings at www.poeticunderpinnings.com.

There is something perfect to be found in the imperfect: The law keeps balance through the juxtaposition of beauty, which gains perfection through nurtured imperfection.

- Dejaan Stojanovic

Playlist: Juxtaposition

by Rebecca Baker

T

his mix plays loosely with juxtaposition within and between songs and is carried by contrasting instruments and melodies that bring the theme of juxtaposition alive in our ears. What stands out to you when in contrast?

Click here to listen to this Spotify playlist oT download this printable page, lc ick

here!

Oma’s Gehaktballen (Meatball) Soup from Tonya Salomons

I

’m six years old. There’s a stool pulled up to the counter and I’m standing on it, my head just barely clearing the big bowl of ground beef on the counter. My Oma is standing beside me; I can smell the L’Air du Temps perfume she dabbed in her elbow joints that morning.

It’s Saturday and she’s teaching me how to roll meatballs for after-church Sunday soup.

“Niet te groot, meisje. Niet te groot.”

Not too big, darling girl. Not too big.

My hands would reach into the bowl, I’d pinch off some ground meat, roll it between my tiny palms and offer it up for her inspection. Oma would offer a quick nod, or reach over and take some away. There were many mouths to feed on Sunday after “de kerk” (church) and I was learning from a young age that meat spread

through a whole meal gave the appearance of plenty. Oma’s version of loaves and fishes.

I wish my memories of these times were more exacting. Instead, I’ve been left with hazy impressions: Oma and I standing hip to hip, her perfume mixing with the spices in the meatballs, an intoxicating aroma of home and safety. After she approved both the size and shape of my work I would drop the finished product into the large pot reserved for soup and would giggle at the sound of the meatball hitting the water.

Once those meatballs were in the pot and it was set to boil, I would watch as her knife slid through onions, carrots and celery, making her cuts small, because my Opa preferred it that

way. Once she was satisfied the meatballs were done, she’d scoop the foam off the top of the water and in went the vegetables, the Maggi, and some salt and pepper. The whole pot would be set on the back of the stove to simmer. After the soup was done, if it was cold enough, the pot would be carried to the back-cloak room where it would stay overnight, with a brick placed firmly on the lid lest some creature decide they wanted meatball soup, too.

On Sunday morning, after an hour of squirming next to Oma, the last chord of the “Three-fold Amen” rang through the church and I would grab her hand and listen as she chatted in a smattering of Dutch and English to friends over tiny cups of coffee. Then we would walk

home, playing marching games, me trying desperately to match her step-for-step with my little legs.

Opa would bring the soup in out of the cold and set it on the stove to simmer. My aunts and my mom would join Oma in the kitchen, where soft white rolls were slathered with butter and thick slabs of liverwurst, gouda cheese or ham.

When the soup, platters full of sandwiches, and the trusted bottle of Maggi were on the table, Oma would ring the brass dinner bell at the bottom of the stairs and all would come running to jostle for a bowl of warmth and goodness.

I miss her. Nineteen years ago this coming February, she went to bed with Opa on a Monday night and woke up with Jesus sometime Tuesday morning. When I first learned she was gone, I was standing in my kitchen. My kitchen, that used to be her kitchen, the very one where the soup magic

happened. I could hardly breathe for the grief of it. Sometimes the loss feels dull, and sometimes it feels like just yesterday that I came completely undone in my uncle’s arms, as he tried to keep me from collapsing to the floor.

I miss her deeply, but I have the memories of her with me every time I make a pot of her meatball soup.

Download the recipe as a letter-size page or a recipe card, just click on the images below!

Roasted Delicata Squash with Wild Rice Stuffing from Allison Duncan

Y

ou may be less familiar with delicata squash than with more common winter squashes such as butternut, which would be a fine substitute for this recipe. But I love delicata’s pretty striped skin, creamy yellow with green or orange accents, and its mildly sweet, buttery flavor. I tried my hand at

growing a variety called Honey Boat this past summer, and it lived up to its name—sweet flesh and oblong shape, perfect for slicing into “boats” and stuffing with autumnal flavors. The skin is thin and edible, and you can also roast the seeds with some olive oil and salt for a crunchy snack.

Download the recipe as a letter-size page or a recipe card, just click on the images below!

with CHRISTIE PURIFOY

S

ome of us garden on acres. Some of us garden on patios. Some of us have killed a few too many houseplants and aren’t sure if we are willing to try again. (I would encourage you to try again).

I have acres here at Maplehurst. A gift and a burden, both. But despite the expansiveness of the canvas I have to work with in this place, the garden that is bringing me the most

concentrated pleasure this fall is the garden I have made with a collection of pots on the four brick steps that lead to our front door.

Though I hesitate to brag (because gardeners never really do master their own gardens), I may have cracked the code on front door gardens. For years, I have decorated my front steps the hard way.

I looked at each container as a garden in itself, and I tried to fill it with some artful combination.

This is not an easy thing to do. No plant is ever really happy crammed in with three or four others, and it

is difficult to find a combination of plants that not only look good together but share similar needs for light and water and food. Attempting a garden in a pot is advanced-level gardening.

I have sometimes made a success of it, and more often not, but it has always been a highmaintenance and frustration-fueled endeavour.

Finally this year, I asked myself why I was cramming multiple plants into single pots.

Why do that when I could simply give each plant its own container and then group those containers together? When the pots are pushed close together, and the plants grow lush and full, I have everything I have always wanted: Happy plants I can attend to individually and combinations I can play with and tweak all season long.

You may not have acres. You may not even have a patio. But do you have a front door? Do you have a front step? I invite you to forget the fussy containers filled with three or more plants. Instead, choose plants you love, give them the just-right container, and group them in a combination that pleases you. Play with plants. Play with color and texture. Simply play.

It is good to try hard things. It is good to embrace challenges. It is good to show some grit. But sometimes it is better to let go and set that hard thing down. Even in the garden there is a yoke that is easy and a burden that is light. Even in the garden we can choose rest.

Praying on the Go

by Troy Cady

I

don’t know what the month of October is like where you live, but I love this month where I live in Chicago because the days provide relief from the heat of the summer and the trees start to change colors. The golds, reds, and oranges dazzle my eyes and enliven my spirit.

God speaks to me through this time of nature’s transition, inviting me to slow down and let the world’s visible colors get inside my heart.

There’s just one problem with all of this: As autumn arrives, I tend to gear up and get busy.

I have a feeling you can relate. How often do we walk right through life’s beautiful mysteries and remain oblivious to God’s presence in

the midst of it all? This month’s practice is designed to help us abide in Christ, to live our life in Him, and to let His life flourish in us...even as we live life on the go.

Click here or on image above to watch Troy’s video

Click to download the accompanying PDF which includes:

• Practice Preparation & Materials • An Invitation to Practice

Tell me a story of juxtaposition in your life...

F

all is my absolute favorite season. Weatherwise, the scents… freedom as the kids go back to school, pumpkin all the things, you name it. BLAMMO, autumn, and I’m in love!

One day in particular is heavy, though. My mom passed away on a late October morning, and that day, in the middle of my season of joy, has always contained either disaster (locking myself out of my house in college

for two hours) or at the very least, sorrow. I set it aside now as a day I know I will end up crying. Not just for the loss of my mom, but the reconciliation of our rocky relationship that will never happen this side of glory, and the loss of potential memories with my kids she will never have. There’s a lot. So I will walk in riotous colors and crisp air and possibly snow (thanks, Alberta mountain climate) while my soul moans away to itself on that one day,

and let myself sit in that dichotomy without resisting. I’ll let grief do its work and also find joy in what’s around me simultaneously, but no less genuinely.

I

have been seeing my spiritual director for about three years now, and she says she has seen me grow in the relatively short time we have known each other. But I frequently complain to her that I am frustrated with not

seeing much progress, both in myself and in my circumstances. She gave me this helpful image: think of a faucet dripping into a bucket.

The amount of water is steadily growing, but slowly, almost imperceptibly. You have to look back over a long increment, juxtaposing the two different amounts of water to notice the change. But eventually, that bucket will be filled to overflowing.

B

efore I went into foster care, I lived in sixteen different houses with my biological parents. And the idea to revisit each of these places has existed in my mind in one form or another for a very long time. As I wrote in the August 2020 issue of Paper&String, “I want to inhabit the space. I want to stand in that space and remember... and I want to stand

in that space and feel what it feels like to have survived.” So, this fall, I went.

My pilgrimage, as I called it, took me thousands of miles across multiple states. And for all but one place, I was able to make my visit mostly unnoticed. At one house, though, a husband and wife were outside, watching me walk down their driveway. I said, “I am so sorry to bother you. I used to live in this house...” And the

woman said, “In the foster house? Were you a foster child?”

I felt the world shift and tilt beneath me as I struggled to process what I thought I heard her say. I was a foster child, but no one knows this about me unless I choose to tell them. Surely, I must have misheard this stranger, standing outside one of the sixteen places I used to live.

As I stood there processing, she began to explain: she and her husband bought the house from a family who had taken in foster children.

And the foster parent owners who lived there after me had added a bedroom, a bathroom, and a playroom, all for their foster children.

It was known as a foster house. As I listened to her tell this story, I finally found the breath

to say, “Yes, I was a foster child. Not when I lived here—but yes. I was a foster child.” And the story this stranger told me was that this house, which held so much pain for me, went on to become a place where kids just like me could be loved and feel safe. What beautiful juxtaposition.

The Team!

Christie & Jonathan Purifoy

live at the old farmhouse in Pennsylvania called Maplehurst and built the Black Barn. Christie earned a PhD in English Literature from the University of Chicago before trading the classroom for a picket-fenced garden and an old writing desk. Now she writes books and raises kids and chickens and tends the trees that gave Maplehurst its name.

Lisa-Jo Baker is a

third culture kid, former attorney, reader, writer, and storyteller. Every Wednesday on the Out of the Ordinary Podcast she and Christie explore the surprising ways that cultivating ordinary life leads to extraordinary stories. She is endlessly fascinated by people and how loud her children are.

Elrena Evans first had the dream of

sending you a care package from the Black Barn. She’s a writer, editor, and dancer, a mother of five, an ally and an advocate. A new Paper&String care package every month is her gift from us to you.

Allison Sheeler Duncan studied English

and theology at Eastern University and is now a writer and editor at a university in southeastern Pennsylvania. She enjoys growing flowers and heirloom tomatoes, watching superhero movies, and trying new recipes.

Anna Grist is the western Canadian in our

midst, working on Paper&String from the Rockies near Calgary. She creates all the design and layout and contributes a few illustrations and snippets of writing as well as laughter and well-timed GIFs. She’s a wife and mother to two human children, as well as twins Quill & Ink (pictured).

Amy Knorr is an educator, speaker and

writer who loves to create contemplative spaces in real life and online. She is in a Nonprofit and Spiritual Formation graduate program with a spiritual direction certification.

Amy has shared a nomadic married life with her husband, Dan, for 21 years. She is mom to two girls growing tall and a son she will hold again someday. She enjoys a good laugh, a quiet moment, a furry doggy face, a challenging trail and a cup of hot tea.

Anna Kocher is an artist living and working

in the greater Philadelphia area. She’s an art teacher, a painter, and mother of three. When she’s not teaching, painting, or parenting she can be found reading, tea in hand and Ella Fitzgerald on the record player. She lives in a creaky old house with her husband, her kids, her dog, Mystic, and Edmund the cat.

Tonya Salomons

lives with her husband in Canada’s largest city.

During the day, she works as a registered social worker, but at night and on the weekends the kitchen is where she finds the space to recharge and finds her joy, feeding not only the body but the soul. She admits to reading cookbooks like they are novels while sipping copious cups of coffee and eating chocolate chip cookies.

by Elrena Evans

Click here to download a printable version of the prayer

God of juxtaposition Your created world cradles the mountain heights And the depths of the sea In both, we see facets of your glory.

God of juxtaposition Your divine plan cradles difficult journeys And moments of rest In both, we see facets of your goodness.

God of juxtaposition Your perfect love cradles our deepest sorrows And our radiant joy In both, we see facets of your grace.

Amen.

paper&string founders

elrena e vans executive editor c h r i s t i e p u r i f o y c o l u m n i s t & p h o t o g ra p h e r l i s a - j o b ake r columnist •

a n n a g r i s t a r t i s t i c d i re c t i o n | g ra p h i c d e s i g n & i l l u s t ra t i o n s troy cady • jonna fantz • jen goodyer spiritual practice contributors a m y k n o r r s p i r i t u a l p ra c t i c e s a n n a k o c h e r i l l u s t ra t i o n s p a t t i o l s o n a d m i n i s t ra t i o n j o n a t h a n p u r i fo y subscriptions & finances al l i s o n s he e l e r d u n c an copyediting t o n y a s a l o m o n s re c i p e c u ra t o r all inquiries contact: p a p e r a n d s t r i n g @ b l a c k b a r n c o l l e c t i v e .c o m p.o. b ox 8 0 1 3 , w e s t g r o v e , p a 1 9 3 9 0 u s a

click here to subscribe to paper&string! click here to gift paper&string! a l l c o n t e n t © B l a c k B a r n C o l l e c t i v e • a l l r i g h t s re s e r v e d