Today was one of those grey city days. Low clouds obscured the tops of the buildings and a cold mist ____ the city… poetic word choice: blanketed feels too cliche, swaddled is too warm, fell is too passive, enveloped? pestered? nibbled? permeated? lingered over the city…. I made my way to Cafe Keough, read a…
EXPECTATIONS: WANTING EVERYTHING AND NOTHING AT ALL
This morning’s fodder begins with the increased pressures we put on our partners and the increasing isolation we feel in modern society. I opened up a new browser tab and after a brief search on the neuroscience of how grief affects the brain, I scanned my pocket recommendations. I’m came across an article in The…
THE ART OF LETTING GO
This is not at all what the title might imply…. intentionally so. Today I spent part of my day at Cafe Keough. I tried to write, texted a bit with a women in Kentucky, read some great poems. I wanted to quote everything. You can walk out of your lifeif sadness properly instructs you.And can’t…
FUNNY CLIPPINGS
So much of what I write is an attempt to straddle the space between happy and sad, joy and pain, love and hate…. not the most lighthearted topics. Today I spent some time cleaning up the photos on my phone. While doing that I came across so many comics that I had taken pics of…
MY CORNER IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROOM
I’m a little slow to start this morning. I suppose this isn’t that different than half of my other mornings. I wrote a title last night before bed – swagger. It was going to be a short playlist of the songs I listen to as I walk around Memphis. There are days I feel like…
A TREMENDOUS DANGER, A TREMENDOUS RESPONSIBILITY
From our formative attachments to our great loves, relationship is the seedbed of our becoming, the laboratory of our self-invention and reinvention. Maria Popova I had a couple of hours on my hands last night. I didn’t go out. I intended to write. I’m finding I’m more productive in the mornings (like this morning). I…
PRIVILEGE AND OBSERVATION
It was a little after 2pm in the high-ceilinged cafe. A man walked in, black jeans, black work boots, too many top layers for the unseasonably warm day. He favored his right leg, not quite a limp. His Jacket was that neon yellow-green with wide, silvery reflective stripes, the kind you see worn on airport…
THE MESSY SPACE BETWEEN
I’m starting this post far too late in the morning for it to be done (well) by the time I have to go to work. I’m trying to be a bit more zen about this and be self-forgiving for waking up later than I had wanted. My plan was to get up, exercise, have breakfast,…
THE REMINISCENCE BUMP
If we want life to slow down, to make moments memorable and our lives unforgettable, we may want to remember to harness the power of firsts. In our daily routines, it’s also an idea to consider how we can turn the ordinary into something more extraordinary in order to stretch the river of time. It…
WRITING, THINKING, DETAIL
Just as I’m finishing lunch and getting ready to head to the coffee shop with my pen and the little notebook I picked up somewhere in North Carolina (Winston-Salem, I think), a notebook which gets far less use than my laptop… I came across this small gem on Brain Pickings. It’s an short examination of…
HOW TO LIKE IT
It’s been a few days since I’ve written. Travel makes a whole bunch of things inconvenient, breaks routine, introduces new ideas, new scenery, new people. I spent the last few days at the NAMM show out in L.A. It was interesting to be around so many music industry people. There were long lines to meet…
NOT DANCING
He was shmoo-shaped and probably in his late sixties. Round and doughy in the middle. His hair was whitish grey and his not so bushy beard masked a soft but protruding jawline. He had one small hoop earring and wore an olive green tee tucked in to black slacks. His sneakers were heather grey with…