Godspeed, Renee Gehman Miller, DreamSeeker Magazine columnist and editor

In her widely read “Water Spouts and More” Kingsview & Co post on her journey with cancer (from which the “guest post” image is drawn), Renee Gehman Miller tells of her panic when young son Jonas says, “Tell me the truth, Mommy.” He was asking about the water spout; she feared he had harder truths in mind. On Thursday, January 11, 2018, the harder truth that Renee was gone arrived, and now so many mourn Renee’s absence while also remembering the treasures of her life.

Among those treasures were not only her 2015 blog post but also her many contributions to DreamSeeker Magazine, the predecessor of Kingsview & Co. She was DSM assistant editor for over six years, starting with the Autumn 2004 issue when she was a junior at Gordon College and extending to Winter 2011, when she had become an ESL teacher and was preparing to launch her new life with soon-to-be-husband Anthony and eventually Jonas. She was also “Ink Aria” columnist  from Winter 2005 on “Seeing Salt in a Different Light” to Winter 2011 on “News to Me.”

This was Renee’s very first “Ink Aria” paragraph:

If you count knowing “This Little Light of Mine” by heart, the Christian calling to be salt and light had been in my head since I was a three-year-old girl singing her favorite song on her rocking horse. After the rocking horse, flannelgraphed Sunday school lessons, church sermons, and going to private Christian school thoroughly exposed me to the metaphors of Jesus, I thought I had it all down.

And this was her final one:

Right now (and this may change) I’m feeling at peace with a smaller scale of news—news from the kids at my school who qualify for free lunches or who don’t know English very well, or who go home to babysitters every night because moms or dads work the night shift, or who have easy, happy-go-lucky lives. Crisscross-applesauce on the rug in a circle. That is news to me.

Then cancer came and after years of not writing regularly for publication, Renee’s new “publication” venue became CaringBridge, with her eloquent updates followed by many. One update became the foundation for “Water Spouts and More.” We agreed that she’d occasionally offer new blog posts, but it turned out that CaringBridge was all her energy allowed for.

Thank you, Renee, for offering us so much. How we’ll miss you. Godspeed.

Michael A. King is publisher and president, Cascadia Publishing House LLC, editor of Kingsview & Co, and former colleague of Renee Gehman Miller.

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