The sun fell on the hills again, the same way it falls every night. Falling off myself, a stranger passing through another town, another rented room. Taking stock of all we’ve taken in and everywhere we’ve been. We are in… Read More ›
Creative Nonfiction
The world of clocks and mirrors
We dropped Lily off at her new school, a “step-down school,” just 40 students with half coming from a residential treatment center and the others a wilderness therapy program like Lily. The town is in somewhere Utah, a town like… Read More ›
Out the other end
I came out the Enchanted Valley the day after I got in, 27 miles (43.4 km) round trip. My phone said I hadn’t gone that far in step count since my last trip to the Hoh River. I ached in… Read More ›
Up the enchanted valley
I sat there by the bees in the lupine with my knees muddy and the birds singing and the sound of some far-away traffic like a low tide going out. I chewed on an apple in a nonthinking way and… Read More ›
Future letters to our former selves
We came down to the end of June and I hung the flag for the Fourth. I had the summer off from work, and wouldn’t accept any new contracts until September. That gave us the flexibility to see Lily whenever… Read More ›
This ocean size
I went back to Forks, the small logging town on the Washington coast, back to the gas station with the sandwich shop and the formica booth out front beneath the mossy overhang, the old sign with 1960s font that says… Read More ›
Second person singular
You knew it would come to this, one day the kids leave the nest. You are left with yourself and your things, the memory of who you were as a couple and who you will be now that they’re gone…. Read More ›
The secret to our future lies
In the dark corners of the library I am looking for my past. The corners are dark because it is the early 80s and I can barely picture it now. The new library has just opened in the old part… Read More ›
Tipping up and touching down
You could think that way if you wanted to, it was a funny way to think. Like you could go back for a redo. I’d been thinking that way for a while leading up to February. It was right when… Read More ›
You can never hold back spring
Spring came quick. One day the birds were back and it seemed like life just resumed. Like everyone had been released from a witch’s spell, that’s how it felt. He worked in the yard and dug the heels of his… Read More ›
Bill Pearse 