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New to Five Minute Observations? Welcome. I’m Joe Class III, and I write stories and essays about what I notice, the encounters that reveal something true, and the moments that stick with you after they’re gone. If you’re just getting started, these three pieces will give you a sense of what this space is about:…
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A fourth-grader’s memory. And the truth that rewrote it.
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A running friend saw something in a grocery store I had yet to name.
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My friends stood at the edge of the pool deck. Family. People who knew me for years and some who just met me. Some close to where I stood. Others farther away, just watching. And that’s the part I can’t shake. They were watching. Clear, cool water. Not cold but cool. The right temperature for…
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Everyone’s shouting. No one’s listening. I’m choosing a different path starting with one question I can’t stop asking myself.
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Blood is pouring from me, from an open wound. Ripped apart, emotionally cut to the bone by those closest to me. Or at least that’s what it felt like to me. I was patiently waiting, longing for a conversation. Even an apology would’ve been nice. At the very least my expectation was a friend, a…
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After my brother James died, people moved on. They assumed I had too. I don’t know that they knew what to say anymore. Either way, they stopped asking. I was forgotten. I wasn’t bitter. I wasn’t unapproachable. I was grieving alone, waiting for someone to remember I was still here. No one came. I felt…
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 “The drinking age should be 25, not 21.” I’m walking through Target when I hear this. A kid in a hoodie, maybe 17 to 23, talking to his friend in the energy drink aisle. It stops me cold. Not because it’s wrong. Because it might be right. GenXers spent our youth figuring out who…
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Friday morning. That was the day I resigned. Three sentences. Three cardboard boxes with seventeen years inside. Pastor Dan walks in while I’m wrapping the African violet Martha Hennigan gave me when my husband died. “What’s happening, Hannah?” Concerned. Pastoral. I try to explain. The church feels less like a community and more like an…
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David wrote Psalm 12 when he was surrounded by people who sounded good. Their words sparkled, shining and glittering. They said the right things at the right times, collecting honors for their eloquence, their piety, their public performances of faithfulness. But underneath, something was rotten. “Help, God—the bottom has fallen out! True believers are fast…
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I’ve nodded at Psalm 133:1 my whole life like I understood it. Lately I’m wondering if I’ve confused unity with something easier: agreement, sameness, not fighting in public. Two recent stories helped me see something uncomfortable: most days, I’m not the one who flinches in the pew. I’m the one holding the keys.
Stories. Enjoy!
