It’s 3:30am. The house is a cool 68 degrees. I’ve been up for about an hour. I went to bed a little earlier which means the 3:00am stirring happened at 2:30. I checked my phone (a not-so-great habit I should probably correct). I had a text from a woman out west. She wants to know…
Category: Life
Molting
It’s midday on Sunday. In the back yard, grackles fall from the sky. They stride across the lawn picking and pecking. They examine the ground, looking down like inquisitive inspectors in black overcoats with their hands clasped behind their backs saying “hmmm, very interesting.” In the living room, a sports show, NFL Today or something…
Swingin’ in a Line, Lined Up in the Sunshine
Monkey mind monkey mind… swinging like grapes hangin’ from a vine. Within the span of about ten minutes I thought about how infrequently my parents have left the house since being here. How my father will go to fewer football games when I’m not around to go with him. How I won’t be here to…
One Year, Fifty-Two Words a Day
18,982 words – give or take. For a year I’ve tried this small artistic and mindful practice of writing fifty-two words every day. The math says I should have written 18,980 words, but I know I had at least one day where I snuck in two extra words (I was making references to a deck…
Fighting the Urge to Get on with It
There’s a blues festival in Arkansas at the beginning of October. I’m thinking of going. I printed out a Sept/Oct calendar and started to pencil in which cites I might visit and when. As I kept adding cities, and as I kept pushing back my departure date, my arrival date has gotten pushed further and…
Patience and Elbow Grease
Every bolt on the toilet was rusted. The shut-off valve wouldn’t close. The bolts to the flange on the floor were stuck. So were the bolts in the tank along with the metal arm with the floating ball. The toilet has always wobbled and probably should have been replaced ten or fifteen years ago. Replacing…
It’s Starting to Feel Real
Ever since surrendering the dog, I’ve been avoiding going for walks around the neighborhood. I’ve been tempted to go many times. I’d come home from work and going for a walk would feel like the natural progression of things. Finally, this past week I took walks after dinner a few different times. It felt awkward….
Hurry Up and Wait
At 10am, it’s sunny and 72 degrees with a slight breeze. I’m sitting on the back deck taking in one of my few remaining weekends here. If the weather cooperates, I might smoke a pork shoulder tomorrow – a final toast to summer and suburban living in a college town. I’ll make enough food that…
Thursday Morning Towards the End of August
The nervous energy on a Thursday morning when a storage container is being delivered to the driveway (between 9 and 12) is palpable. I’m all over the place. I sat down at the computer at 5ish. Like most mornings, I wanted to write something. I wanted to try a new-to-me writing technique where I would…
Let the Talkers Talk
On Sunday, I went to an outdoor show with a friend and two of his friends. We drove winding back roads past farms and farming communities. On the way back to town, the sun dipped behind the mountains and cast a soft and beautiful peach and yellow glow. On a weekend overrun with traffic from…
Obsessed with Authenticity
A list of things I’ve tried to write about: birthday gratitude, being unconventional, a recent job interview, the new/old brand of toxic masculinity, what I value in life (related to the job interview and also the birthday), an observation from an exchange with a guy who was trying to sell me a new roof. Birthday…
Winging It
On Thursday night I was giving away a few books to some friends. One friend had asked for the book on Cat’s Cradle I had edited. Because he seemed more interested in it as a work that I had created/compiled than as a collection of criticism, I gave him copies of the literary journal I…