I had 30 minutes in the car yesterday to think about what is waiting for us in the afterlife. It just so happens we were on the way to church. The kids traditionally read their books while we drive, but there was no “we” this weekend. Colin was out of town. So I had some…
In reading the pile of reports the school sent over regarding my youngest child, I thought: that’s not me. On every occasion in parenting, I am reminding how very few people I encounter — whether as friends or acquaintances — who really understand me. They do exist, and they are ridiculously loyal. But the by…
Who is Sally thinking about today? Her daughters. Her friends. Faith. Her mom. Dan, of course. On any given Friday, Sally jumps to the beat of love. Sally moves to move you, drives to inspire you. A Monday morning dawns and she Breaks out of the blocks, running down The day’s, the week’s, the season’s…
It’s a perfectly lovely, breezy day, and I’m walking my daughter to school and taking the dog for a stroll. Conversation surrounds whether the dog minds being on a leash and “Dogs have feelings too mom!” I’m feeling general anxiety I haven’t felt in weeks, frustration that ebbs over the general state of the world…
I experienced mizzle, again, tonight. This time, without you. Our first mizzle draped the English town of Dover at night. Friends’ laughs echoed in our wake. A mizzle clouded all the air space, As we strolled under repeating Streetlights from B&B to seafood joint. We arrived damp, the standard condition of Englishness. Our second mizzle–…
Dali broke with the Surrealist movement Cuz they didn’t like that he got famous. Jealous bitches be like “yo Sal, Babe, ain’t no way to make, like, Art and also Cash.” So he and Gala bought A boat and she ditched her Husband and they made out for France to Hide and read and Butter…
(This post is a part of the #reverb16… what’s that? Check it out!) The prompt for today’s #reverb16 calls for me to channel the warmth of the tropics (despite our New England locale). Prompt #6: Sunny Surprises. Most of North America starts to get frosty and cold this time of year. If you had an unusually warm…
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…
That’s the “story” I like to tell myself, though it isn’t true: I am not a finisher. I recoil at the examination of my life as such. Why? Because my life is a veritable trash heap of unfinished projects. I start all kinds of things — scrapbooks, craft projects, closet clean-outs, books, writing books, pet…
All of life is a thing marked and used.This is the island where my mother is still living. There is not a great deal of the “normal” here. We are just a bunch of hangers on. For those of us here, we are eating off the breadcrumb trail from whence we came. There is a lot…
After the doctor broke the news to my mom and dad and me that mom would die soon, I held onto the 15 cent spiral notebook like it was a life raft. There isn’t enough time to ask and get answers to the really big questions in life before life says “I’m outta here.” It…
This past weekend, I had the chance to return to a place I once considered home: Kansas City. By home, I mean it was the place where I became the person I am now. I lived in Kansas City from the ages of 24 to 34. For those 10 years, I was single, except 2…
See this awesome family? These grown-ups are two of my oldest friends, T. Mallie and Adrian Brathwaite. Mallie (yes, that’s what I call her) and I have known each other since we met working at the Iowa State Daily back in 1990. She and Adrian met the same year when she was bartending and he…
The brutal impact of self-censorship Right now, you are experiencing with me my biggest risk of 2013. Back in 2009, after the kids came to live with us, the kids’ attorney advised me to consider cutting back on my online presence. I was shocked. I felt sick. It hadn’t occurred to me that the family…
Trying to come up with a single small kindness to write about today for Fiona’s blogsplash has been one of the more difficult writing assignments I have been given in a while. Some of you know me, and so know the story of our family. If you don’t, I’ll just say that ours is not…
