Some here say to just wait a few minutes and the weather could change in an instant. There’s nothing quite like the seasons in Chicago. Some inhabitants surrender to the intolerance, moving elsewhere, shaking their heads. Not me, though. The seasons in Chicago are like yin and yang, or the Cubs and Sox, the Bears and Packers, the Mayor and [...]
In the sleepless of night, my mind loosens and my thoughts chase. Thinking too much . . . anxious feelings . . . unhappy ways . . . keep me from falling deeper into subconscious. And then in the beyond, where my mind hovers, I hear the rhythms of a train cutting through the darkness uniting with its tracks as [...]
I have been diligent for almost a week in rewriting my memoir manuscript, "Under the Birch Tree." I've acknowledged open doors signaling me that it's time to look up, and not at me feet, and walk through the timing as it is opportunity for progress. It's time to pick the book up once again, leaving behind the work of polishing [...]
You never know who you’re gonna meet once you start talking to him or her. My week was looking like a travelogue of nations united. Megan is my go-to person for all things related to painting fingernails and toes. I paid her a visit one Monday morning. We got to talking about business, customers, how long she’d been there. She [...]
Do you take a look at your feet – ever? Or maybe you only notice them when you go to fit yourself with a new pair of shoes. But do you really look at them? Do you notice changes from chubby feet as a kid to now with slender toes and narrow arch? If only your feet could narrate a [...]
In Jill Jepson's latest blog post, she suggests we let anger be our writing guide. Jill, author of blog, Writing a Sacred Path, tells us to listen to what our anger is telling us. Is it evoking a fear? Is it defining our boundaries? The more we write, the more we can discover the sources of our anger. In doing [...]
I’m going to write a book report. Some of you may not know what I’m talking about but can probably deduce that I’ll be writing a report on a book. When I had book report assignments in school, I had to discern what the story was about. Otherwise known as “theme,” sometimes I thought I didn’t really get the entire [...]
I read a line somewhere, sometime, during one of many memoir writing researching binges. At the time, I was working backwards. I wrote a memoir, well, a very first draft, and then I read anything I could about the non-fiction category. Headlines stating "Personal essay" or "First-person essay" also caught my attention. I Googled and searched, walked Barnes and Nobles [...]
I hit the road early this day last year with blue skies and a sun that showed the exceptional day well with a temperature of 71 degrees and light winds. Forty-five minutes later, hangar 1005 was difficult to find among the winding, curvy access roads. I didn’t even know I was in terminal 371784. I thought a mere technicality, but [...]
I grew up attending Holy Cross Catholic grade school in Deerfield where having a conversation with God, or “maintaining a dialogue” as the nuns told us, was as important to our education as getting good grades. I was told that if you prayed, evoking God in your “dialogue,” you will be okay. Trust God and you won’t fear anything. I [...]