Questions of the earth and environment meet questions of the universe. And such.
I’m driven mad by the meticulous. That doesn’t make me admire them any less, however, or realize that they, in the end, will always succeed. Case in point, the magnificent stone-man, Lew French. One rock at a time, he creates magnificent walls, fireplaces, cottages. One wall, in a home on Martha’s Vineyard, took him a…
Kids. Boy we sure do love ’em. Even people who don’t actually like kids I bet would be pretty quick to acknowledge that kids — although sometimes a pain — are love machines. They make it. They reflect it. They live it. They embody it. They are our teachers in it. So we love the…
I remember you, you Lost soles, you distant loversForgotten from those daysSo long now in those Foreign lands. Everything we Predicted happened– weLost touch. We forgot what itFelt to be connected: first toEach other, and then Through each otherTo the pulsing, quaking potentialOf our shared mother, who isn’tDead yet, but merely laying in wait– Gentle…
On the struggle with the existential meaning of writingOne of the toughest parts about being a writer/artist is doing the work. The nitty-gritty everyday work. The reason isn’t writer’s block or lack of time. There’s always time — everyday — for me to sit down and write. The reason — for me, and I am…
If I had chosen a word for the year in 2018, it would have been the word “move”. As in, after 11 years, I finally made a MOVE again– BIG TIME, half way across the country, packing up a four bedroom house and a family and a life — and this time back to a…
The extremely useful writing website Writer’s HQ recently called for pitches related to the theme of “Resistance” and writing. For me, the idea of resistance and protest is highly emotional. I’ve been known to get “worked up” on a topic or two in my day! Any person who stands ready to challenge the status quo…
Can I change the world? That is the question I want to put to myself and to other writers in my re-boot of THE BIG QUESTION series at Letters from a Small State this month. Why this question? Because it leads to so many questions! Is the American experience rapidly becoming a series of knee-jerk…
It’s true I have trouble with you, With everyday compassion, Because It means forgiving the person Who drops poop bags to the ground– Listening between sarcastic comments for Pain and fatigue. Everyday compassion the Off-gassed namesake of Life. I’ll have to be More than OK with rigid people– Got to See myself in them, to Assume…
(This post is a part of the #reverb16… what’s that? Check it out!) Gifts giving and gift receiving is inevitable from here on out until the 25th and beyond. With that in mind, today’s prompt asks us to slow down and consider… Prompt 7: White Elephant: What are the gifts you’re looking forward to giving, or…
Why I Changed My Mind and Took the PillsWhen I got to the point where I really truly thought “hey yeah… maybe I should take pills for depression,” I felt a lot of things. Failure Yep. I failed. I just could not “get over” my excess “emotionalness.” Here, there and everywhere I went, feeling anxious…
My mother was not sentimental. She saw the world in a very pragmatic way. If you were not feeling happy, well… just cheer up. If you were feeling ill… well, wait awhile. Things were bound to change. The Meaning of Auld Lang Syne I wished I’d asked my mom more questions about her own level…
It’s all too easy to put off loving where we are until everything is perfect. What can you love about where you are now? Blergh. If I were a weather man, that’s how I would describe the weather today. Cold, damp, rainy, grey. It’s all about the view. I look out my window and what…
“20 questions for a New Year’s Eve reflection” is posted originally at “The Art of Simple” blog. I’ve decided to post the questions here and drop in my answers. 1. What was the single best thing that happened this past year? When the judge said: “You are now officially a family.” 2. What was the…
Resolve – Firmness of purpose; to solve a problem or a dispute. My word for 2013 was “resolve.” I dissected that word last December, and like any misguided wordsmith, instead of thinking “how does this apply to me” I just pulled it all apart and wrote in second person. I have a tendency to do…
I submit to you this broken heart. A year ago, I (unintentionally!) kicked a little snowball down a snowy hill, and I discovered how cold and mean life can be. I am awfully terrible at telling personal stories, and since this story has intertwined a few other hearts of people I love, I am not…
