It’s been about six months since my last post and even longer since I’ve written regularly. I thought I would start back writing again after I finished graduate school, but then I started my first full-time job in 17 years—17. YEARS. Oh my.

The last time I worked full-time was in 2002. Back then, there was no Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and this website did not exist. But, by that year, the use of Google (as a verb) had become so important enough to be a nominee for the American Dialect Society’s 2002 Word of the Year. In 2002, we were still trying to understand the bombing of the World Trade Center, and the country had entered into the War on Terror with George W. Bush as president.

If you are able to personally remember any of that, you might feel really old to see what was going on in the entertainment industry at the time. Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane were headlining the biggest Broadway show of the year, The Producers. That was the year that the second Harry Potter movie came out as well as the part 2 of The Lord of the Rings trilogy. And get a load of the most popular musical artists for that year (below) Fun fact: Jennifer Lopez had only been known as ” J Lo” for a year at the time.

Also in 2002, making her first appearance on planet Earth, was my sweet daughter, Gracie. Goodness—look at my big hair in 2002! But Gracie—she is looking like quite the grown up nowadays, isn’t she?

About two years after Gracie, Josh was born—he was my second reason for staying home so long. He was a big baby then, but now he’s taller than both me and Gracie!

While I am counting the years, we had another milestone recently. This past summer, my husband and I celebrated 25 years of marriage by traveling to Quebec, Canada. We sat in outdoor cafes and felt very international, saying, “Bonjour!” and “Merci!” to everyone. The pic below was taken during one such a cafe-sit-down, and was also with my pre-job-hunt haircut.

And so. Here I am. Now that I have two pretty independent kids and I am back in the working world, it’s kind of like coming full circle. The dust has settled, so I have been wondering what to do about writing. I wondered if all of that was just a season? Do I have time now? Is that even what I want to do?

Working in a job where I am creating learning activities all day is like a dream come true for me. But, sometimes it can leave me creatively depleted. What I had to think about is what I’m missing when I’m not writing—I had to think about my WHY. Why do I write, anyway? And it comes down to a few things:

• Writing is a way of erecting Ebenezers, marking the ways that the Lord has moved in my life, remembering, so I don’t forget. This is a way of participating in the good that God does because He is a rememberer and a writer, too.
• Writing is a way of collecting my thoughts; it helps me to come to conclusions that I might not have come to, any other way. This collecting is essential to curating the good that God is doing.
• Writing is a form of worship for me. In curating the good, I put His good on display. I add my voice to the rocks that cry out (Luke 19:40), to the Cloud of Witnesses from Hebrews 12, and to the angels that surround the throne of the King of Heaven and cry, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”

So, my prayer is to fold writing back into my life—to return to curating the good, here by taking note of the really neat things I’ve been learning. We never stop learning! What have you been learning lately?