Lori Mullins Ennis
I'm a writer and a speaker, a storyteller and a friend. I'm a griever who finds joy almost everywhere I can, and I really, really love to laugh.
I've spent most of my adult life making home after home after home as a military spouse—learning that home has a whole lot less to do with an address than I once thought.
I've also learned that sometimes life divides itself pretty cleanly into before and after.
Losing my mom to breast cancer in 2003 changed the way I thought about what we put in, on and around our bodies and sent me down a path of living as non-toxic as I reasonably can. Losing my son Matthew in 2009 changed just about everything else. Somewhere in the aftermath, I decided I wanted to do this life with as little regret as I could manage.
Not no regrets. I'm not that good.
Just fewer of the ones that come from not going, not trying, not saying it, not loving people well, or waiting for some imaginary better time.
I once was an extrovert who loved to introvert before Matthew died. Now I'm probably an introvert who extroverts really well. I love people. I love hearing their stories. I love telling stories. And I've spent a career doing exactly that—as a writer, editor, speaker and communicator.
Along the way, I've learned a lot. Some of it because I went looking. Some because life handed me lessons I never would have chosen. Some because I bought the thing, tried the thing, went to the place, asked the question, made the mistake or found something so darn good I couldn't keep it to myself.
That's really what Things I Know Now is about.
I'm not here because I know everything.
I'm here because when I know something worth sharing, I usually do.