Hello there, I’m Kristine —
a novelist, wife, and mother of three.
I’ve just commenced my fourth year of teaching our children at home, which still surprises me every day. In another life, I worked as college student affairs administrator and spent my weekends photographing weddings and portrait sessions until that became my sole work. After six years, I shuttered my photography business to make home and write words, best I could.
My path has been anything but linear, but I’m grateful for every step.
To be firmly planted in these callings of mothering, teaching, writing, as challenging as they may be at times, is a gift. These days, I write between the margins of our school days and am actively seeking representation for my first novel, “The Other Side of Hope,” with a few other projects in the pipeline.
I’m an introvert who exists comfortably alone, but has learned to need her people. I love great coffee and hot cups of milky, sugary tea, especially shared with the ones I love. I live for dates with my husband of sixteen years and our kids are so cool and so fully themselves, I often say I want to be like them when I grow up. A year ago, we brought home a puppy who literally walked right out my dreams and into our life. Some days, he drives me absolutely bananas.
When I’m excited about something, you’ll know it. I love what I love, but I’m quiet about what I don’t. I collect books and vinyl and good gin, and am happy to wax poetic about all three. The list of music I love is far too long for this space, but my tastes are eclectic and varied. Character-driven novels are my absolute favorite to read, and I think Fredrik Backman could write the copy on a package of toilet paper and I’d read it and probably still cry.
Traveling around the country and the world, taking road trips with my family, and learning about new places to visit are some of my favorite hobbies. I study maps like it’s my job. And when I can’t travel, I love getting lost in story at the movies because few things hold the magic of a giant silverscreen, a tub of buttery popcorn, and an icy Cherry Coke in hand.
Why “My Pen in the Air”?
In her poem “I Happened to be Standing,” Mary Oliver ponders the constitution of prayers: what they are, where they go, and what they do. Mary was famous for paying attention to the tiniest details in nature, for tucking pencils into trees around Provincetown, for bringing us to tears, and for helping us to see.
I don’t know about you, but:
I know I can walk through the world,
along the shore or under the trees,
with my mind filled with things
of little importance, in full
self-attendance. A condition I can’t really
call being alive.
And I don’t like it, that self-attendance.
But we live in a world in which it’s rampant, and choosing to turn away feels a whole lot like swimming upstream. Often, the weariness of going against the current compels me to pull myself, soaking wet and gasping for breath, up the muddy banks of the river.
I lay there in a heap, my light long-since gone out. It feels like sitting on the sidelines.
While I was thinking this I happened to be standing
just outside my door, with my notebook open,
which is the way I begin every morning.
Last summer, I experienced what I might dare to call a renaissance, and I missed connecting with the people who’ve supported my creative leanings over the years. I’ve learned it’s okay to have something to say, but the manner in which it’s shared has to feel real and good and true and beautiful to me.
Which brings me to this place.
I wouldn’t persuade you from whatever you believe
or whatever you don’t. That’s your business.
But I thought, of the wren’s singing, what could this be
if it isn’t a prayer?
So I just listened, my pen in the air.
And I’m so happy to be here, listening and sharing.
Why subscribe?
Every post goes out entirely free to all subscribers, though my more personal essays may be quietly tucked behind a paywall a few weeks after they’re sent out, mostly to protect what is closest to my core.
You may notice I have paid subscriptions open, thanks to the gentle, generous nudges of a few readers who pledged contributions to my work long before I’d even produced much content. If you have the means and feel so led, your investment in my dreams is more than welcome but not required.
Writing, for me, is the cake and the icing; compensation is truly the cherry on top.
