BEFORE LOVE
If you snip a few of the blooms that grow on the garden edge with sharp shears. If you cut in pursuit of beauty, in the hope of bringing...
stories
for the information age
These bite-sized stories chronicle my efforts, both pitiful and successful,
to navigate the rapidly-changing world.
My hope is that they help you do the same.
Search
- Sep 14
- 1 min
EMPTY-HANDED
In the bookstore, the fusty scent of ink and pulp. I want to lie down on the floor and breathe in the smell of words. I want to hold the...
- Aug 25
- 1 min
INTO THE NIGHT
Last night, a cricket was in the house. He made his high-pitched song and I listened from bed. He trilled and he chirped. He was calling...
- Aug 19
- 1 min
TELL IT AGAIN
As we meandered through Roman ruins, my son told us about the Tetrarchy, the ambition of Constantine, the greed of Nero, the eloquence of...
- Aug 3
- 1 min
I HAVE DOG-EARED YOU
Sometimes, while I write, I put a pile of books on the table next to me. From time to time, I touch the pile, hoping for some osmosis of...
- Jul 28
- 1 min
WHEN WE WERE APART
There were no cellphones back then. Back then, when we were apart, we wrote letters to each other. On legal pads, or binder paper. In...
- Oct 28, 2021
- 1 min
I'VE CHANGED MY MIND
I push the weights up and down on the wobbly workout bench. I notice my body in the mirror—still able, but altered somehow. I look away...
- Apr 15, 2021
- 2 min
THE LIFE WE WANT TO LIVE
In each of my childhood memories, smoke plumes across the scene. My parents smoked in the car, tipped ashes out of the triangular window,...
- Mar 26, 2021
- 1 min
NOCTURNE
All day I wait for night -- the cricket whir, the moonlight, the hush. If daylight belongs to all creatures, night is possessive; it...
- Feb 26, 2021
- 1 min
NOTHING TO READ
I was twelve years old when I read The Old Man and the Sea for the first time. I was terribly moved by it, by its stark beauty and by the...
- Feb 4, 2021
- 1 min
WINTER PRAYER
It is winter. Even in California, the air is icy and the rainstorm we have waited for all year clatters down. This morning, a respite and...
- Dec 10, 2020
- 1 min
THE LONGING
My life so far can be divided into chapters of longing. Longing for attention, for safety, for being wanted, for babies, for knowing...
- Nov 12, 2020
- 1 min
RISE
I have been trying to smile when I wake up in the morning. Not the big, toothy, glad-to-meet-you smile, but a quiet smile, an...
- Oct 15, 2020
- 1 min
SCRAWL
I keep two notebooks on my desk. The first notebook is over-sized – I bought it at an extravagant home store and thought, this will...
- Oct 1, 2020
- 1 min
THE HOLLOW
Nowadays, around 6pm, I begin to prepare for bed. I cook, I eat what I have cooked, I clean the mess from the cooking and eating. My mind...
- Sep 24, 2020
- 1 min
COUNTING SLEEP
It has been one month since I kicked my cellphone out of the bedroom. And since that first evening, I've slept an average of...
- Sep 10, 2020
- 1 min
REAL LIVE PEOPLE
I have been trying to look at real live people. It is a particular challenge right now - what with face masks and the general...
- Aug 13, 2020
- 2 min
SLOSHING ABOUT
When I was a kid, my family moved from California to Massachusetts during the high heat of summer. It was a trying move - we were two...
- Jun 12, 2020
- 1 min
GRADUATION
Last night I looked at all the photographs. Two decades of life in a night. I don’t know how I felt after seeing so much of our past –...
- May 9, 2020
- 1 min
WAITING FOR BIRDS
I sit on the threshold watching the sparrows. My own kids are on the edge of this nest and I cannot help but see them in these birds. I...