Brave New Year

Happy New Year, everyone, and here we all are once again. You might notice that I've made some changes to this blog. I'm not yet done. Perhaps I'll never be done, but I needed a change, and I needed it before the new year started. As many of you already know, the last six months…

When the Going Gets Tough …

I usually go walking and that helps to a point. I am still grieving for Maxine. I guess that's no surprise, but I didn't expect to fall into a depression, one that I'm still trying to climb my way out of. Although it's not fair to use my husband as a therapist, I've been doing…

Happy New Year and All That Jazz

Another year begins and not a moment too soon. I say "Good Riddance" to 2021. Yet another year of angst amongst preventable and unpreventable tragedy. I don't have great hope for 2022 being a better year. I'm just hoping it won't be worse. I'll be doing my part to stay positive, to live in the…

Life in Non Sequiturs and (Trying) to Get My Writing Groove Back

In a New Yorker article (September 13, 2021), author Amia Srinivasan made this observation: "[...] the Internet, [...] has simultaneously given us too much to read and corroded our capacity to read it." The context was feminism and what we think we know about it, but her description of how the Internet has impacted reading…

Waiting for Good News Sometimes Pays Off

You all were so kind with my last post that I want to give you a brief update. Bear with me because the news starts out as not-good. My sister had a setback on Saturday. She was moved back to the hospital and given IV fluids. We were all very upset, not understanding what was…

What’s the Worst That Can Happen When I Don’t Write? #MondayBlogs #amwriting

I don't like complaining ... in public, anyway.  And I don't like making excuses.  Unfortunately, complaining and excuses seem to go hand-in-hand for me.  The thing about complaining is that there is always someone worse off than me, which should give some perspective.  And the thing about excuses is, nobody cares.  We all have excuses. …

Meditation on Life and Mom #MondayBlogs #MothersDay

My mother is one of 12 children.  She is 92 now.  In all likelihood, she'll see her 93rd birthday in late October.  She was a middle child, but now she's the oldest, having survived six of her siblings.  The youngest girl, my Aunt Edith, is in hospital now.  Dying.  From cancer that appears to have…

Reblog: Hope

I can think of no one who inspires me more to embrace life, to find joy when I'm at my lowest, to know that when I can't change the circumstance, I can still change my perspective. Through her example, she has taught me that even though I've gone through some rough times, I've gained more…

From Interesting Literature: Guest Blog: Why Read Dickens?

This quote sums it up: “We need to read Dickens’s novels,” she wrote, “because they tell us, in the grandest way possible, why we are what we are.” via Guest Blog: Why Read Dickens?.

Writers Can Have Lives Too

Guest blogger at the Writer's Resource Center, Cesar Torres, argues that writers can (and should) have lives.  He presents five ways to "get your life back."  They involve the usual (but critical) "using time effectively" to intriguing suggestions of being "present with people."  To learn more, click here to read the full post.