The day after I got back from Amsterdam the sun came out and my mom and I took the dog for a walk in the woods in the nearby town Bietigheim, while the kids went to a circus. All the… Read More ›
writing
When you’re lost in the rain in Juarez when it’s Easter time, too
I envied Andrew Gabler for all he had that I didn’t have. He wore name-brand clothes, had chestnut-brown hair that shone, was good looking and built, athletic, played soccer better than I did and wrestled (though I always thought wrestling… Read More ›
‘Are you a real writer?’
I had to wean myself off the pocket notepads I used for more than 20 years. The pocket notepads went in my back pocket and made an outline of themselves like a tin of chewing tobacco. The pocket notepads started… Read More ›
Thinking about writing, talking about writing, and writing
I learned there was an artist in our neighborhood who wrote gothic fantasy stories and illustrated them and his name was Brom. It gave me hope there were other freaks in the suburbs like me. His house seemed normal enough… Read More ›
And now, this is what 8 o’clock feels like
In 1994, Bukowski died at 73. It’s hard to imagine we have so many days until we don’t. He said don’t die before you’re dead, hold your head under the water, play the violin. Plant tulips in the rain. But… Read More ›
Irish I could write like James Joyce
Originally posted on WHAT THE HELL:
Writer and friend of the blog, Bill Pearse, and I were touching on James Joyce the other day in the context of one of Bill’s posts over at pinklightsabre. Dubliners, specifically. Something he said…
We dropped the flyer for the middle school orchestra concert between the bleachers and left the chicken on the refrigerator
I got so mad at the chicken I roasted I couldn’t even eat it. I started working on it at 2 PM but it wasn’t ready, and out of the oven, until just after 6, right when Lily needed to… Read More ›
Every day I can I’m going to write
We drove to Fremont, a neighborhood my kids have never seen that’s in Seattle and just 35 minutes from our house, and when we got there and saw the stone troll under the bridge, the tourists pulling over taking selfies,… Read More ›
Most of them witches
In the manner of my mom’s partner Eberhard I held my head under the hand sink and let the cold water run over me and down my torso as I stood and grunted, examined myself and got dressed. It makes… Read More ›
Factotum (for Peel)
After college I moved to the beach and got a job delivering pizzas; my friend Peel moved to New York and dabbled in homelessness and then on to Portland, where he fell in with a group of shoplifters who returned… Read More ›
Bill Pearse 