What I love about writing--- You can let yourself slip into any setting--- any story. You can close your eyes on a summer day and transport yourself to a platinum-colored winter night where the velvet dark huddles beneath the fir trees. You can slip from the fog and rain of the northeast to the cicada-filled, … Continue reading Good Writing, Hard Discipline
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The Depths of Procrastination
I walk out to my kitchen. The cold floor tiles numb my bare feet, but I stand at the sink for a moment. I’m avoiding things. A pile of things. I reach over for my stainless steel french press. The plunger makes a metallic zing when I remove it from the carafe. Oh, yes, I’m … Continue reading The Depths of Procrastination
Talking to Yourself
How do you keep someone from becoming a ghost? Write things down. Make the memories more concrete. Life is transient in more ways than we imagine. You take things for granted. You imagine certain people and things as part of your life forever. However we don't realize we are creatures who live with an ever-present … Continue reading Talking to Yourself
The Slipperiness of Time
Memories are like ghosts, really. You go about your day just as you always do--- wash the dishes, straighten the couch, make coffee, drive to work. And just when you think everything is normal, you walk through some gossamer thread like a spider's web across your path. Suddenly you're not walking up the stairs to … Continue reading The Slipperiness of Time
The Start of Something, Perhaps…?
It was a new house and yet an old house. It sat at the end of a dead end street beneath the spreading branches of an orange maple tree. It had a deep back yard that would be dappled with sunshine in the summer, four stories--- if one counted the basement and the finished attic--- … Continue reading The Start of Something, Perhaps…?
Time for Change
I ran through a maelstrom this morning--- or at least, what felt like one. The wind shook the trees, and in the autumn-dark morning, the shadows from the streetlights danced and morphed. One strong gust tossed the top of a giant maple back upon itself and a stream of helicopter seeds fluttered high through the … Continue reading Time for Change
The Note on the Counter
He left the note sitting on the island counter top where, by the time she woke up, it had gathered a small pool of sunlight to itself from the window above the sink. The sight of it took her breath away in a sickening whoosh when she stumbled from her bedroom. Dear Cass, it read, … Continue reading The Note on the Counter
Conversation Outside a Funeral Parlor
Marie walks up the partially cleared sidewalk out front of the funeral home. It is already dark outside and the lights in the windows glow golden and inviting. She places her cane and tries to straighten her back for her sister’s sake— the one who has passed. A slow trickle of people step up from … Continue reading Conversation Outside a Funeral Parlor
Re-Entry
Wayne stands in line at the service desk of his local box store. He bounces from heel to toe as he waits and fidgets with his mask, then remembers he shouldn’t touch it and rests his hand at his side. The lone woman working the service desk chomps gum (perhaps thinking her mask hides it?) … Continue reading Re-Entry
My Own Emptiness
A cold November day floats flakes of flurries on its cutting breeze. A wide table in a sun-bright room is stacked with papers at its head. We file in, five of us: the closing agent, the officer from the bank, my real estate agent, and the buyer’s agent. My attorney flicks through the pages waiting … Continue reading My Own Emptiness
Seeking Prose 