Process

I feel my pores open soaking up particles of light. Above me on the hill, the tiny newly greening leaves are making chlorophyll. Each one, still small and delicate, fluttering, transparent in the slanting afternoon sun. I am pulling nails from boards, my body becoming familiar with the weight of the hammer, the torque of [...]

Getting there

Spring up here in the north part of the country is a gradual unfolding. Each day, a little more–but not all at once the way I always felt it was in Connecticut. Maybe I was too busy to notice before? The lilac blooms before they’ve burst. The way the grass is suddenly lush. The outlines [...]

I need your help

I’m ashamed to admit–I actually know next to nothing about web design and I barely understand how my publishing platform works. Are you surprised? Yeah, I’d like to learn–but seriously, where would the time for that to be found? So instead of learning, today I am begging. If someone has the fancy shmancy web skills [...]

Fingers crossed

I remember going down a water slide for the first time: I was six or seven, it was the apex of summer and very hot. We were in L.A., at someone’s backyard pool, with the babysitter. I didn’t know how to swim—or at least, I didn’t know how to swim without support (I remember clinging [...]

Wild creating

An empty page; rough sketch paper, then black paint in arcs. I have no idea what my creation will be. I rip paper, and find I’m drawn (after all-day rainstorms,) to the bright images of peoney blooms in a glossy magazine page. I press the shreds of the hot pink pentals onto the page, then [...]

Being related

I drive my mother to the airport early, and on the way home stop for straight-from-the oven croissants and scones. I get a small coffee in a paper cup with maple syrup and cream, and snatch a little solitary time at my computer, nibbling on a date scone with lemon icing. It is only a [...]

Ways of looking at the pieces

The past few days have been piled with small fragments. Tesserae. A jigsaw puzzle in a box. The deadline for the house is rapidly approaching: five weeks until our lease is up here. Five weeks to do: drywall mudding, paint, floors, kitchen, and both bathrooms. My mother is here for a visit, and seeing her [...]

The past three days by the numbers:

8 hours spent writing applications. 6 application packages sent out. 400 other applicants competing for the same positions. 1,000,000,000 units of stress about obtaining one of said positions. 1 mother visiting. 5 loads of laundry done by said mother. 1 happy grandson. 6 hours of drywalling. 1 diningroom completed. 2 black-hole hours at Home Depot. [...]