By Fundamental, by Jene’ Jackson on her birthday, today, as she drove home down Colorado Avenue after writing all day. Perhaps, pungent as the cut onion’s night after night spray in kitchen curtains pervasive as the toddler’s goo griming the minvan seats tenacious as the smoker’s film of brown on bedroom walls,
Happy Birthday, Mom
Dear Mom, Happy Birthday, mamadear, on what would have been your 69th. I’m sitting here about to watch an Agatha Christie movie, whom you loved, eating beets then pecan shortbread, which you loved (as do I), end-of-week tired from work you would have been so happy to know I was
Forest Fires, Drama Queens, and Authenticity
This is an excerpt from The Oat Project, from the rock concert chapter. It may or may not make the final version (coming this summer!!!). Enjoy…and now, back to it. It’s like World Wide Wrestling. What is that fake-fighting impulse? Do we all have it in one form or another?
Lists and Christmas: The One Thing I Want for Christmas
My childhood Christmas lists were a work of art. Crafted from hours with my nose in the Sears catalog, the key at the top was essential. Need Very Badly = NVB. Need = N. Want = W. Want Very Much = WVM. Each item (often topping 100) was coded, with its
The Layers of Funeral Day
A year ago today, my family and I, with 200+ folks, honored my mother’s life, celebrating her beautiful spirit at her funeral. She died on December 4th, 2012. This past week has been intense, sortof a dual living, split in time between now and a year ago, like it’s layered,
The Somersaulted Rant of Sheisse (Thank You)
This whole thing started with “Sheisse!” (“shit” in German) And I felt justified in saying it, too. Out loud, even! For Stuff has gone Wrong all day. Broken dishes, broken wifi, broken me…ah, there’s one part of it. Only in the last few days has my mom felt…gone gone, physically
Struggle as Strength: How NPR’s Story on Education Helped Me Keep Writing
Do you have kids? Students? Family? Friends? Please read or listen to this story I heard on NPR’s Morning Edition today (then share it!). Its core: “For the most part in American culture, intellectual struggle in school children is seen as an indicator of weakness, while in Eastern cultures it
How Today is Like Homemade Butter
Today feels like butter. Well, like making butter…deep, emotional, existential conversations bubbling up and coalescing from what seemed like milk-plain, catch-up chats. I’ve been getting raw milk from the amazing folks at Larga Vista Ranch for a while now, and though it is for my children, usually I end up
The Circle
Today, two dear friends of mine met me at a coffeeshop to revive our improv writing group. This is not “improv” like acting but writing. One of us prepares or proposes a prompt, then we write like the Furies for a timed number of minutes, then read aloud what emerged
A Wild and Crazy Night
From the outside, she is carefree. Photos show a gal who knows how to live it up and cut loose. A girl who spent a whole summer sowing wild oats intentionally, learning how to integrate the Wild. She’s even written a book about it, and is telling the world, putting
