Where Differences Meet

A personal essay by Shae McCombs

Why do differences frustrate us, like a screech on a chalkboard? The chalk is not wrong and neither is the chalkboard.

You save yourself for the people that you know and trust. You lay out clues when you meet someone, cautiously, like little breadcrumbs in Hansel and Gretel, hoping that someone will follow you into friend-ship.  how it is for me, anyway. I’ve felt that way since I was a baby girl. I don’t play my music in the car with strangers. I swallow my jokes when I meet someone. I let my fake self go out to play just in case something bad happens. But when I play music for someone new, a connection begins. 

 

When Air Becomes Breath

 A Personal Essay by Megan Anderson

Who would true valor see/ let him come hither.../ then fancies fly away/ He'll fear not what men say/ He'll labour night and day/ to be a pilgrim

I read the last few words of When Breath Becomes Air slowly, so as to enjoy every last word to the end. Paul Kalanithi’s wife had to finish his book for him; the antagonist of his story killed him. She told us
about how much he loved and how much he lived to the end. I’m fighting back tears like Paul fought cancer. I’m failing, like he did. No. Paul succeeded. He reminded me why I love and live. He did that by greeting me kindly with raw emotion and sleepless nights and failing health. Like Paul, I watched myself waste away, wondering what would come of it. We’ve never met, Paul and I, but we have walked a lonely path together. He struggled, but he was honest with himself. I think it’s time for me to do the same.

My Faith is Not in My Father

A personal essay by Erin Lee

“I am not the child my father raised, but he is the father who raised her.”

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My father is a faithful man. He reads his scriptures daily, attends church every week, and participates in whatever role his local congregation asks of him. I grew up faithful as well—my religion was and is at the core of who I am. As a child, I idolized my father as the pinnacle of spirituality and faithfulness; I emulated him any time I could. So when I found myself questioning whether my father was the man I thought he was, I also found myself questioning my faith.  

How was I to separate my faith in a perfect God from my imperfect mortal father? Where had those roots first begun to intertwine? I read Tara Westover’s memoir, Educated a few weeks into September 2020, and I saw myself in it (the quotes between this essay’s sections are from that book). Though Tara’s upbringing was much more extremist than mine, I understood the battle of faith and family, of love and distance. As I read, I found myself remembering the moments when my father and my spirituality had collided.