Where do you stand in a world looking only for exotic names, skins, and avatars? Where do you stand when you're just bland milk with a brain and thoughts that do not fit? It seems to me the world wants bland, uniform innards coated by a colorful shell. It doesn't want bland on the outside … Continue reading Exotic Milk
When I was a child, I was fascinated by abandoned things. Houses, roads, plots of land, store fronts— whole towns. It didn’t matter. My imagination exploded whenever I came across the empty, the broken-down or the grown over. To this day, vivid memories— like snapshots— live on in the back shelves of my brain: a … Continue reading The Fault Lines of Nostalgia
I had forgotten how differently paced life is when you must go into the office to work. From the moment you wake up, you feel as if you cannot catch your breath. Is there enough time to get my run in? ... Did I remember to lay out all of my clothes last night?... Meal … Continue reading The Return
January cold has come to roost here in the North. It makes everything so much more complicated. Just to step outside and scatter ice melt on my frozen driveway takes about forty-five minutes of preparation and just as many layers of clothing. My mornings runs become afternoon runs because of a negative wind chill factor, … Continue reading That Perfect Something
Wishes die slowly, fighting with every kick and punch and gasp. But wishes– dreams– are fanciful things made most of midnight talks and music full of empty drums and open spaces. Dreams are born of a lonely heart, twenty-two years too long, and hope like a prune. Loneliness is the twin to dreams. It is … Continue reading Two Sides of a Coin
All of a sudden, the gray skies open and lose their payload. Sheets of rain cascade past my windows and strum amidst the pebbles in my driveway. Their chorus floats back to me faintly through the closed window– a throaty song rather like a wide arena filled with applause. But who is it the rain … Continue reading Applause
I keep expecting things to shatter. I pick up my French press, the dishwater drips, suds slip down its sides. I think: the noise this thing will make if I drop it… I can almost feel the shards bounce around my toes, crystal and sharp, winking in the light. I can hear the smash, the … Continue reading They Break so Easily
I sit at my computer biting my nails. It's a bad habit I fall into when I'm highly anxious. I scroll through the screen reading submission guidelines and articles in Literary Journals and magazines. What is it about reading other people's work that makes one feel inadequate? I stare at the glossy photos of the … Continue reading Impostor Syndrome
Have you ever met someone who loves books and stories just as much, if not more, than you? You can always tell another literary fanatic by the way their eyes light up when they recommend a book to you. This isn't just an: "Oh, that's nice. You should check it out," kind of light in … Continue reading The Maniacal Reader
The downy quilt of winter has returned. Front yards spill white toward the dark, wet slash of the street. Garlands festoon the front of my neighbors' houses. I've decorated for Christmas myself, and I find life settling into that familiar hectic holiday pace. When to write! The snatched moments come between car rides and family … Continue reading Everything and Nothing
Seeking Prose 