It begins when I know that silence will hurt me and those I love, when the comfort of my life will not insulate me from the damage that will afflict millions for years to come if I am silent. It begins with a 4 a.m. ride to the airport on Inauguration Day to catch a 6:30 a.m. flight to Baltimore. … Read More
Catching Days: A Guest Post and Goodbye
For fourteen years, this dog has witnessed every word I’ve written or struggled to write. When Cynthia Newberry Martin invited me to write about one of my days on her blog, Catching Days, Chloe guided me one last time, this time with her absence. I share it here in her honor. To read, click here.
Weights and Measures
Since January 1, I’ve walked 212 miles, more or less. I’ve lost ten pounds. I’ve consumed an average of 55 grams of fat a day that account for roughly 30% of 1,440 calories net, per day. I’ve lost the tips of three different fingers on my left hand to knives wielded by my right. I lost a friend. I’ve caught … Read More
Wild Women Walking
When I set out to write this essay, I thought I was going to write a droll list of reasons why I could never have written a book like WILD. The list would have included a story about me, a boyfriend from the city, the field behind my parents’ house which shone brightly under the full harvest moon that Labor … Read More
Old Yeller and The Repo Man: Thanksgiving 1986
The movie is Old Yeller and it plays out on the television in the corner of the hospital room. My son, then eleven, watches from the bed through eyes compressed nearly shut by a sinus infection. An IV beeps. Antibiotic seeps into his arm as it has for nearly four days without appreciable effect. The father and the neighbor are … Read More
When I Die, I Want to Become a Tomato
When I die, I want to be composted. I’d like to come back as a tomato. When I tell my family this, they just sniff and look somewhere past my shoulder, as if I’ve just farted. If they picture it all, they envision a long process, maggots, turning my body with a shovel, watching me swell and liquify and, of … Read More
Revisions
Revisions: a promising word that grows out of a hopeful thought: to see again. I’ve spent the better part of the past six weeks revising pages I’d “finished” two or three times already. More than once, I have gone still before my computer screen and thanked Allison Hunter who asked me to look again; to see them anew. Those pages … Read More
Monday Letters
It’s five o’clock on Monday morning and my mother sits in bed, knees up, a pad against her thighs, her second cup of coffee steaming within easy reach. Her pen flies across the page in front of her leaving behind a trail of thoughts that have been on her mind for days, minutes, or take shape as she writes. I … Read More
About A Boy
Today, April 20, is about Easter. It is also about a boy. The boy in this picture came into my life on April 20, 1975. He doesn’t look this way any more. He’s taller, his shoulders sometimes hunch when the world gets a little much for him, there are a few lines at the corners of his eyes when he … Read More
Journey to Now, Again
I read MAGICAL JOURNEY last summer and shared my thoughts and a free copy about it here. The paperback version has just been released and Katrina Kenison is offering several opportunities to win a copy of this book and others free. On January 29, we drew the name of Misha Gericke of South Africa as the winner of Magical Journey from the readers … Read More