Quest Physics

“In the end, I’ve come to believe in something I call “The Physics of the Quest.” A force in nature governed by laws as real as the laws of gravity. The rule of Quest Physics goes something like this: If you’re brave enough to leave behind everything familiar and comforting, which can be anything from […]

Let’s date.

We all need to go on more dates. With ourselves. A woman on LinkedIn began a discussion in which she asked what advice her readers would give someone who’s trying to reinvent themselves. The answers were varied — some thoughtful, some semi-cliché. Some were vague (“think logically”) and some were rambling. One woman recommended the […]

Fair Share

My neighbor dropped off a Christmas gift tonight. Unfortunately/fortunately, it’s edible. What was masquerading as your basic apricot pastry from a local, mildly famous bakery was, in reality, more like a delicious, stone fruit pizza, complete with a buttery, flaky, croissant-like crust, sweet glaze and sugary frosting swirls on top. Why can my diets never […]

Sparkly silver.

I arrived home this evening to something lovely in the night air. Someone had a fire going, and its smell was drifting through the neighborhood. Church bells chimed. The streetlight was illuminating a misty haze settling in for the duration. Neighbors’ Christmas lights were on. Finally, the weather was beginning to feel the way it […]

Here a Rut, There a Rut

My annual rut has arrived. I usually stumble into one at some point during the year, but “stumbling” seems to imply that there’s a sort of uneven ground that your feet happen upon, followed by some more shuffling as the soil gives way to rockiness, which gives way to a gully. This year’s rut feels like I […]

18.

Eighteen. The number of days left — including tonight — until I will have blogged daily for two years…minus a small hiccup last summer when the Palm Springs heat lulled me to sleep without warning…and without writing. Oops. Eighteen years ago I was eighteen. But I can only say that for thirteen more days…then 37 […]

Here.

I’m here. Sometimes it feels otherwise, like those nights when I’m too tired to think, to write, to move. But at this moment — listening to my laundry tumble about in the dryer, picking out the faint clackety-clack of a train’s song being carried through the night air and trying to ignore my hunger pangs […]

Charcoal.

Asphalt. Concrete. Cinder block. Metal. We were playing a high school basketball game on a campus that felt more like a prison. I didn’t want to be there. I kept looking over my shoulder and wondering who might shank any one of us if we scored against the home team. How did we end up […]

The Snacker and the Universe

I managed to do what’s damn near impossible for most people: I burned my microwave dinner. Last time I was at the store, I happened upon some frozen “lean gourmet” pepperoni pizza snackers. Hm. A way to get my pizza fix that’s both lean and gourmet? Sign me up. They weren’t bad. I made a […]