My husband died. He wasn’t young any more and was sick and weak but we weren’t expecting his death to come as quickly as it did, within a few days, almost overnight. He just went away. Maybe there are worse things than a quick, quiet death. Here’s what happened next. My brother and sister-in-law (who […]
Mind/Brain
Eleven years ago this week, my 67-year-old mother died from a brain tumor. It was Glioblastoma multiforme, an insidious fourth-stage cancer that, without treatment, usually kills within three months. Treatment options are miserable for the patient and not terribly effective; for those who opt for surgery and radiation/chemo, the cancer almost always returns within a year […]
Over the past six weeks, my sister and two of my dearest friends have celebrated landmark birthdays (the kind with a zero at the end). These festivities have left me thinking about birthdays. Why do we celebrate them? A birthday represents a lap around the sun — 365 Earth days, or 8,760 hours. But let’s […]
Back in 2012, I wrote about my compulsive counting habit. I’m revisiting it now, in hopes of collecting stories from other counters. If you count too, I’d love to hear about it. Leave me a comment. For as long as I can remember, I have counted. If I’m on a train I might count the […]
I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about my bloodlines. Perhaps it’s my impending fatherhood, perhaps I’m just at that age. I’ve been tracing my grandfathers’ heritages back through the Revolutionary War and to the Tudor conquest of Ireland. I’ve planned a trip to Norway, which is my grandmother’s homeland, and hope to […]
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about an old friend of mine named William of Occam. You know the guy I’m talking about, right? Skinny little kid in the monk’s robe who doesn’t say much. Sure you do. Some guys call him “Sharp Willy” or “Billy the Knife.” I’m not sure why, I assume it […]
It’s a beautiful spring day here in the Canadian Rockies, and inside my head I’m a slightly less perky Julie Andrews running through the fields singing The hilllls are alive, with the soouund of muusiiiiiic. I’m feeling much more upbeat than I was a couple of months ago. Sixteen hours of daylight stretch gloriously before […]
This is my last regular post for LWON. Thank you, readers, for indulging my ramblings about mushroom ice cream, eyeless crustaceans, and transit-chasing Frenchmen (not to mention my Canadian spelling habits). And thank you, fellow LaWONians, for letting me be part of your wonderful writing community. I’ll miss you guys. Lately, my dreams have been incredibly […]