When I was sixteen, my voice teacher predicted I would become a Jack of all trades. It wasn’t a compliment: We were in the midst of a fight, squaring off across the shiny black battlefield of her baby grand piano. She wanted me to concentrate only on singing. But I couldn’t imagine abandoning subjects like […]
Month: June 2021
We first saw the elk in September. Our route to the Wilder forest passed the Yaquina Bay, and there, between the road and mudflats, was an antler rack we initially mistook for a willow tree. Our neighbor said it was likely that hunters chased them out of the hills. That they were a smart herd. […]
ABSTRACT What is it about watching kids be kids that is so fascinating? That makes us snap too many photos and text other adults or Tweet at the world in the middle of the day about some random or mundane thing they just did? It might have something to do with the infinite enigma of […]
Over the last week I traveled from town to town in southwest Colorado giving stage performances at night, telling stories about being here at the height of summer, tales of drought and wildfires and raging thunderstorms. The moon and stars passed over our open-air venues. I gave the show some science and some mysticism, in […]
They were dark forms scattered up and down the beach. One here, three there, a pair just beyond them. Their larger size distinguished them from the other shorebirds, drawing our attention. “What are they?” my dad asked. “Whimbrels,” I said. We were at Fort Stevens, a few miles outside of Astoria, Oregon, my hometown. My […]
About a month after I was born, billions of Brood X cicadas came out of the ground, mated, then died. Over the next few years, I learned to walk, to read, to count. I began and quit dance lessons, piano lessons, youth orchestra, soccer, basketball, tennis. I made friends and grew apart from them. I […]
Where do you go to read? There’s probably a chair or couch in your home where you read, but I’m talking about when you go somewhere to read. Out of personal preference or because homes can be chaotic or lonely, is there somewhere you go? I’ve keenly felt the loss of a place to read […]
“ “What even is consciousness, though?” my friend B wondered yesterday, squinting into the sun. The air was full of cottonwood dander. Floating on the breeze, the tufted white seeds looked like they were suspended in deep water. She was nervous about the anesthesia. Four masses in her abdomen, one the size of a football. […]
