I have a personal policy: never read the comments. And when my book was published last year, I quickly learned that I probably didn’t want to take note of the reader reviews at Amazon either. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love hearing from readers. Nothing makes me happier than receiving a personal note from […]
Miscellaneous
I am alone as I write this, as I have been most days the last eight months. There are many things I know I miss: french fries fresh out of a restaurant kitchen, killing time in a bookstore. Other deficits have been more subtle, things I know aren’t available to me right now but that […]
This is a conversation the People of LWON had late last March when, along with the rest of civilization, we were going bug-nuts with covid stress. We had decided we couldn’t keep up a five-day-a-week posting schedule, we’d have to cut back to three days a week. We didn’t like this, but we talked through […]
I’ve always been fascinated by tales of postal heroism. Not the manufactured goodwill of a reply program for letters to Santa Claus, but the everyday challenge of figuring out what a sender intended and getting the letter into the right hands. It’s become a bit of a sport for snail-mail loving citizens, and the postal […]
This post originally ran August 16, 2018. But as COVID19 cases surge, hospitals reach capacity, and the long, dark winter descends, you can bet I’m again feeling the weltschmerz. Two years ago, a poet named Maggie Smith wrote a poem called ‘Good Bones.’ I printed it out, and I find myself reading it over and […]
As the days get colder and darker, and the escalating pandemic keeps me homebound, I’m trying to make the most of what I can see through my windows. Last week I bought a beautiful vintage hummingbird feeder made from a blood-red glass bottle with fluted sides. I filled it with sugar water and hung it on my back porch, where […]
I’m a little bit low on perspective right now, so I’m checking back in with the trees for some resilience inspiration. This post first appeared in 2018. There’s a quote I’ve seen attributed to Ram Dass about why we should turn people into trees. When we look at people (or ourselves), we judge. We compare. […]
When, years from now, I reflect on the debacle that was 2020, I will remember it for COVID, of course, and for its possibly planet-saving election; but I will also recall it as the Year of the Fire Tower. Decommissioned fire lookout towers stipple ridgelines across the West, many of which can be rented for […]
