Bob had a beard before any of us. And I never saw him without his baseball cap. Bob drove a pickup truck, chewed tobacco and could always be counted on for having weed. Bob had a canoe too, so one… Read More ›
Creative Nonfiction
Beware of Maya
Drab autumn days. Leaves the color of old copper coins. Days meant for sofas and blankets and gloomy tunes. In short, my favorite kind of days. Days of tea and cloudy afternoons and poetry. Days of naps and not brushing… Read More ›
Portrait of a domestic house cat
When Timmy got agitated, which was often, he’d go to the wooden frames throughout the house and scratch. That or the carpets. He’d left the leather sofas alone but they were still ruined from him jumping up and down on… Read More ›
Dark enough
At last all the leaves were down. I used the tractor to grind them to bits and the blower to scatter the remains. In no time I’d been to Portland and back to the dark of my morning den. The… Read More ›
Field recordings, Portland
I went back to Portland to see my childhood friend Loren for the night. Arrived early and left 24 hours later. We took our familiar walks and ended things where we started, at his local coffee shop, Keeper. In the… Read More ›
Waning crescent
Made plans to drive to Portland for the weekend and see my childhood friend for a night. Woke at 0330 too excited to sleep and used my phone light to pack an overnight bag: just my toothbrush and night guard,… Read More ›
Salad days
I remember leaving that apartment on Spring Street. It was the first place I lived alone after breaking up with my girlfriend. Spring is one over from Union on the edge of Seattle’s Capitol Hill, inside the Central District. Not… Read More ›
Walter Mitty, Walter White
Can a person die from too much Kringle? I have tried. And why does it all come from Racine, Wisconsin? Why not Denmark? Do Danes in Wisconsin have the actual recipe? This pillowy danish with crack cocaine icing and nuts… Read More ›
The sun is the same in a relative way
Not needing to go to school on a Thursday in late November was nice. I remember standing outside the car in the early afternoon noting the sky, the dull lead color but the light no less, heading to my grandparents… Read More ›
Renewal
I went to our local Indian bazaar for fresh curry leaves and bought what I thought was spinach but when I looked at my receipt it said pulsaag, an Indian spinach alternative also known as basella, a climbing vine. I… Read More ›
Bill Pearse 