On a crumbling, narrow road, thirty-two houses sit on either side of a gravel-ditched apron. My home is one of the few remaining cottages built in 1947 for wealthy folks to escape the city to the north suburbs. A patchwork of gray-blue clouds pulls like taffy across the eastern sky. The earth, browned and parched, carries unseasonably warm breezes for [...]
With summer’s spirit still lingering in my thoughts, Fall is muscling her way into them. It’s a visual time when change is never more apparent than now. Awareness is heightened as my surroundings of deep green fade from the flora’s coats, and petals of red and yellow and purple drift gently toward the parched earth. Before I let go of [...]
Last month, I wrote here about retiring from the past and embracing the future. The thoughts sprung from the decision to retire my website. But before I could move forward, I reined in the memories from its inception to now. In 2013, I created a website, developed from writerly beginnings on Blogspot where “Magical Thinking” took me to places [...]
a river's reflection of heaven and earth Many years ago, there was a small ranch-style brick house on a large lot the next block over. Once a golden honey color, it had turned to a brown mustardy yellow. The house has since been demolished, and a larger, modern two-story has taken most of the space in the large lot. [...]
An awakening started with a potted plant. It sat tall bedside in front of a window to capture what little light it could from an otherwise dim room. I wrote a while back on this blog about a much needed green thing during the winter. It popped from the mother plant, a small thing that pushed its head through the [...]
When I considered preparing for a book launch talk to be customary, as I had been talking about my debut novel, The Wisdom of the Willow, for some time now, it wasn’t. I had been preparing answers for questions when I realized I had been playing it safe with my writing. Over the past twenty years, I have [...]
One fall morning while treading the parched earth through the woods, I veered from a narrow path to a short bridge hunched over a sleepy river. A pair of mallards commanded a “V” through water like plate glass. Oaks, in states of bright fall undress, hugged the banks. Peace and a soft landscape filled my vision. The sun’s rays [...]
Recently, I opened an “All Photos” file on my computer where I have over 1000 photos, dating back to 2008. With each click of the next photo, I recalled when and where the photos were taken. I considered each snapshot to be a moment in time, uttering, “Oh, that was when . . .” as I had a good [...]
A rusty paper clip held them together. Typed letters, faded from the dark-inked punch of typewriter keys filled lines on discolored pages rimmed in muted brown. Stories told here were pulled from a brown envelope written over forty years ago by my then college self. The pages took me back in time to settings and places where words were heavy [...]
Tucked in a corner of a shallow closet for two years now is a metal file box. I’ve always known it to be there, despite it being hidden by a stuffed bag of unwanted items for the Goodwill. Opening the closet door was like cuing a flashback when several rosaries, a wooden cross, a small statue of the Virgin Mary, [...]