Erin Loechner
Author of The Opt-Out Family and Chasing Slow and founder of Other Goose, Erin Loechner has been writing online for two decades. Her heartfelt words and design work have been showcased in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Today Show, Huffington Post, and a two-season HGTV.com web special, garnering over one million fans worldwide.…but that’s not what she wants you to know about her. She wants you to know this:
“There are published bylines and international speaking engagements and sold out product lines. And these are real and true and good and exciting, but these accolades, I want you to know – these are not me.
If you come to my house, I’ll forget to tell you where to put your coat or hat or keys because I’ll be ushering you into the kitchen for a drink, some pistachios. I’ll want you to sit down and spill it. What are you learning right now? What’s going on with your kids? And where did you get those incredible pants? This means that if you’re coming to my house for a meal, you’ll likely get take-out or a frozen pizza. I cannot simmer or saute or poach while engaged in a conversation, and I’ll always choose the conversation. Sorry about that. Come anyway, please.
We might talk about religion, too. I have a deeply rooted faith in God, but I will say this: I sometimes find myself disenchanted with modern churches and American Christianity. I say this not to spark a debate or discount the beauty of community, but to extinguish the assumption that Christians have it figured out. I wonder if I’m doing it wrong – if we’re all doing it wrong – and have a very real desire to strip religion down to the bare basics that Jesus taught: servanthood and obedience and generosity and grace and reverence and love and love and love. The hard kind of love that’s grueling and messy, that heals marriages and surprises strangers and transforms generations. The kind that cannot possibly be done in our own power; the kind that makes God evident, tangible. Real.
For every well-written bio – cursor blinking, fingers hovering – life can sometimes look like a dance. Like beauty. Effortless, perfect.
But we know better. Dancing can bring blisters, too. You can’t see them beneath the shiny patent heels, but they’re there. They’re always there. So if you come to my house, I’ll forget to tell you where to put your coat or hat or keys. But I know exactly where the Band-Aids are.
Here’s to blisters and bios, Band-Aids and beauty.