How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing. Annie Dillard, The Writing Life A day such as this, in which I endure a measure of sickness or unease, is a reminder that the redemption of all…
Tag: quarantine
Blank Days and the Bulletin Board
Ah, world, what lessons you prepare for us,even in the leafless winter,even in the ashy city.I am thinking nowof grief, and of getting past it; I feel my bootstrying to leave the ground,I feel my heartpumping hard. I want to think again of dangerous and noble things.I want to be light and frolicsome.I want to…
One Dress, 100 Days; One Body, One Life
I did a weird thing this winter. Like many people, I’ve noticed time passing differently in the last 13 months. Slower, perhaps. But more than the speed, time has slipped by without the usual markers. No graduations last spring, few weddings in the summer, no back-to-school in the fall and strange holidays to close the…
March 10th
This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm 118:24 On March 10th, it was cold and sunny, which is about the best we can hope for in Seattle in the late winter. It was track-meet cold, the kind of weather when you make plans to be outside because…
In the Valley, With Bread and Masks
I will remember last week—one of a handful of representatives from seasons that I keep—turning them over and over like pebbles from the beach, as the week that 2020 crashed into us. Before this raises any alarms: no, none of us is suffering from the coronavirus, and no, our house didn’t burn down. Nothing really…
Messy Beginnings
June 23, 2010 I sat on the cold floor of the airport as my last day living in Seattle changed over to my first day of living… away. It was past midnight, and I leaned against the wall, having just checked my carry-on at the gate so as not to have to bother with it…
All These Treasures
We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it, if it were not the earth where the same flowers come up again every spring that we used to gather with our tiny fingers as we sat lisping to ourselves on the grass, the same hips and haws…
On This Year Without A Spring
As far as unpopular opinions go, I’ve never been terribly shy about disliking spring. It’s nothing personal; it’s not even universal. I don’t like spring in Seattle, and it’s all about the weather. Dreary autumns and rainy winters feel appropriate, but when spring declares itself with still mostly rainy days that are maybe five degrees…
Sleeping The Time Away
If you poke around the internet for long enough, you may discover a set of confessions that include the phrase “I think about this a lot.” The objects of this thinking vary widely, from Ina Garten declaring magnanimously that “store bought is fine” (referring, I think, to chicken stock and breadcrumbs) to the shocking fact…
Reimagine.
Ah, world, what lessons you prepare for us, even in the leafless winter, even in the ashy city. I am thinking now of grief, and of getting past it; I feel my boots trying to leave the ground, I feel my heart pumping hard. I want to think again of dangerous and noble things. I…
The Way Home 