Michelle DeRusha's Blog

It’s Been Awhile…I’ve Missed You (and the Back Patio newsletter is making a comeback!)

WOW…so much has happened in a few short months. The whole world has shifted on its axis since I published my last blog post on March 5. I didn’t see it coming…did you? I remember watching the news about the coronavirus coming out of Wuhan in February and early March while I ellipticized at the gym, and I thought oh boy, but I never, ever imagined it would come to this. None of us did…or at least, those of who don’t work in the fields of epidemiology or infectious disease. I suspect the ex...

A New Season & an Announcement

Hello dear friends,

This isn’t a typical blog post but rather, an announcement of sorts. I’ve decided to take a six-month hiatus from blogging to pursue the possibility of what I am calling a “longer-form writing project.” I know, could I be more vague? It’s not intentional, I promise.

The thing is, I’ve been feeling an increasing pull over the last couple of months to go deeper with my writing. I’m not yet sure what this will look like, but I do know that because of my work schedule at The...

Why I Am Choosing [Flat Bread] Life

The same verse — Deuteronomy 30:19 — crossed my path twice in two days last week, and when that happens, I pay attention. I first read the verse in Sarah Bessey’s new book Miracles and Other Reasonable Things (which I loved and highly recommend). Then I read the very same verse again the next morning in Christine Valters Paintner’s book The Soul of a Pilgrim (which I also loved and highly recommend):

“I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and...

Drop Your Nets

Last weekend I read the story in Matthew 4 of Jesus’ call to Peter, Andrew, James and John to follow him and become his disciples. “Come,” Jesus said to the fishermen. “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”

Matthew tells us that all four men immediately dropped their nets, left their boats and followed Jesus, and I wondered, in that moment, what Jesus might be asking me to leave behind in order to follow him. My initial response was, “Nothing.” After all, I reasoned, last year was...

Why We Need to Cultivate Harmonious Passion in Our Work

Photo by Noah Johnson

I haven’t always been a writer. I wasn’t the kind of kid who scribbled stories or penned poems or daydreamed fantastical narratives in my head. I didn’t dream about “becoming a writer” someday.

When I went off to college I majored in English mainly because I loved to read and could craft a well-structured, articulate research paper. After I graduated I worked for more than a decade in both the corporate and the non-profit worlds, where I wrote annual reports and...

To the Land I Will Show You

I have always loved the start of a brand-new year. I relish swapping out the wrinkled, scribbled planner for a brand-new one chock-full of white pages and empty squares. I love to makeresolutions, to list out goals, to dream and plan. I love that the dawning of a new year offers the perfect opportunity to reflect on what has passed and plan for what is to come.

I spent some time over the holidays thinking back on 2019. It was a year of big change and transition for me – both professionally...

Top 10 Favorite Books of 2019

The year is not quite over yet, but I wanted to share my annual Favorite Books of the Year post with you, in case you need some good bookish gift ideas for the readers in your life (here are my2017 and 2016 favorites lists for more ideas; I deleted my 2018 list by accident – oops!).

In 2019 I read 67 books, compared to 58 in 2018. Because I commute an hour back and forth from Lincoln to Omaha three times a week now, my audio book tally has increased quite a bit — 13 audio books this year...

How to Have More Fun

“Do you think it’s too late for me to become a fun person?” I called out to Brad from my perch on the sunroom loveseat.

“That’s a really un-fun question to ask!” Brad called back from the kitchen. His answer made me laugh, but my question was a serious one. I wanted to know: is it possible for a person – for me – to learn how to have fun?

This past September my 14-year-old son Rowan and I drove to the sprawling Lancaster Event Center to attend the Lincoln City Library’s annual used book...

Enter Into

Last weekend I read through all my journal entries from the past year (a task that was equal parts cringe-y and illuminating), and I was shocked to see I’d written in mid-May that I was ready to begin my next creative project (though I admitted I didn’t yet know what that “creative project” would be).It had felt, then, like I was on the cusp of something new. I was eager to plan, to begin putting steps in place toward execution. I was ready for the next thing.

It’s clear to me now, six...

I Contain Multitudes

Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)
— Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

“I’m not a gym person.”

This is a declaration I have made often, and for the last 15 years or so, I’ve believed it and lived it. For as long as I have been a regular exerciser, I have been a runner who runs outdoors. I relish the bite of winter on my cheeks in January and summer’s humidity pressing heavy against my limbs in June. I love to glimpse what’s blooming as...