She’s really not my kind of girl — most of them have tattoos or nose rings — but there’s something about her smile. She smiles like she’s in love with whoever she’s looking at. She smiled at me a few months ago. I’ve been trying to get ...
Like most young Annawadians, the girls considered the caste obsession of their elders to be an irrelevant artifact. Manju and Meena had become friends because they both loved to dance, and stayed friends because they could keep each other’s secrets...
Her husband and her children did not consider her beyond criticism. She belonged to them; whatever she did affected them; their pride, their good name in the world lay in her hands. They would give her love, protection, even a sort of homage, but in ...
It felt great to be loved. Children... Children are a hazard to your life... As they'd got older they had become more expensive. But it was worth it. If she didn't have her children her life would be empty. And even though your children leave your ne...
We periodically return to the throne of God for a transfusion of reality. It helps us recall that the redemption of mankind doesn't depend on us. Sometimes we lose sight of that. A visit back to the throne also reminds us of the One who loves us and ...
I fell in love with Erica Kane the summer before my freshman year of high school. Like all red-blooded teen American boys, I'd come home from water polo practice and eat a box of Entenmann's Pop'Ems donut holes in front of the TV while obsessively fa...
There's nothing better than having a baby. I've always loved children. I used to work summers at the YMCA and be in charge of, like, 30 preschool kids. I knew that when I had a child, I'd be overwhelmed, and it's true... I can't tell you how much my ...
I'm not going to do anything crazy, but I want to do music that I'm passionate about. I'm finally at an age where I can do the music that I grew up loving, which was urban pop, '90s music. I grew up listening to the divas, so I'm very happy to finall...
My habit would have been to veer towards the dark - to prove I was something; edgy, or maybe to prove that I was cognisant of the dark side. Now, with age and confidence, I can say, yeah, that's true, but I am cognisant of the fact that people can do...
It's pathetic, but I don't really remember my first time reading 'The Great Gatsby.' I must have read it in high school. I'm pretty sure I remember it being assigned, and I generally did the reading. But I don't remember having a reaction to the book...
My father died of brain cancer in 1991. I do not know anyone whose life has not been touched by the loss of a loved one to cancer. I wrote my book 'Gracefully Gone' about my father's fight and my struggle growing up with an ill parent. I wrote it to ...
I've always had a huge fear of dying or becoming ill. The thing I'm most afraid of, though, is being alone, which I think a lot of performers fear. It's why we seek the limelight - so we're not alone, were adored. We're loved, so people want to be ar...
Australians love to pump you up when you're nobody. Then, when you start to put your head above water and say, 'Well, actually, I am a bit different, I am an individual and I do have a particular talent', or whatever, they want to go after you. But t...
Many a sin has sullied me in body and in soul because I did not restrain my thoughts nor guard my lips: nevertheless it is to Thee, O God of majesty and love, that I turn in my extremity, for Thou art the fount of mercy; to Thee, as quickly as I may,...
I am definitely a Type A personality, always rushing around, trying to do too much, not good at just lying on the beach. But I'm so thankful for everything I have: wonderfully supportive parents and sisters, the best husband in the world, terrific st...
Question for your life: Let’s say we’re on a date, and I’m being all seductive by talking nonstop about such interesting topics as intergalactic nano armies and the precise elevation at which a really tall building becomes a skyscraper, how wou...
There is no problem too large that God can’t handle,” Mamm assured. “Besides, God showed me a wonderful verse from His Word. Romans chapter eight verse twenty-eight: And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to t...
we unwittingly project onto God our own attitudes and feelings toward ourselves... But we cannot assume that He feels about us the way we feel about ourselves -- unless we love ourselves compassionately, intensely, and freely.
The quality of health care continues to improve, and people are living longer, but these developments mean that we’re likely to eventually find ourselves in a situation in which we’re forced to make difficult choices about our parents, other love...
Lord, you are God! You made us. Who better to know how to fix us when we've gone wrong? who better to set us to rights again? Who better to love us through the fire and refine us into something beautiful and useful despite our wrongs?
We aren't who we want to be. We are what society demands. We are what our parents choose. We don't want to disappoint anyone; we have a great need to be loved. So we smother the best in us. Gradually, the light of our dreams turns into the monster of...
