Category: memoir

Bless the Bittersweet

September 23, 2024

A rickety screen door teetered on rusty hinges as I pulled it open and stepped into the tiny ante-space that introduced the kitchen. I paused, allowing my eyes to adjust to the dim light as I inhaled the musty scent of things old. In the quiet, I waited for the space to speak. Who knew what had lain settled in memory’s crevices for more than half a century? Time warped as I stepped into the kitchen and looked around, surprised. It was a miniature version of the space that, moments earlier, I’d have sworn was a large farmhouse kitchen. Contradictory

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Meditation and Imagination: Warmup Rituals for Courageous Writing

October 20, 2023

“How did you end up here?” It’s what people ask foreigners or people who’ve been through tough times. The grammar offends me. What is the referent for here, exactly? This country? This town? This relationship? This trouble? This chair? On the floor? On the rise? Indefinite antecedents should be a felony. And—end? I’ve yet to meet mine. I don’t mean to be ugly, but could we at least change the verb to one less terminal? Alight, maybe, or land, though the latter sits heavy. Either trumps the alternative. Earnest or incredulous, the question in question lays track on my life’s

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Butterfly Fierce

October 14, 2023

Expectations have been my downfall, and my choices have led to predictable disappointment more than I care to admit. Perhaps that’s why it irks me to no end when the ink of a good pen runs dry prematurely. I expect more of them, frankly. Like life, so the pen writes. I wax poetic as I reach into my desk drawer to retrieve another from my stash and find disappointment. A lone red pen is all that remains. Red ink is as offensive to the page as an overcooked metaphor. I compose the hard bits in longhand. Maybe blood-colored ink isn’t

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First Things First: write first, worry later

September 10, 2022

Most worry about how to tell their story impactfully without inciting the wrath of anyone whose behavior the writer exposes and condemns. I understand the concern. It’s legitimate. However, the time to worry about such matters is not when composing a draft.

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