Reposting the story of the Christmas we spent in West Cork, 2016. We debated what to do with the uneaten ham. It was impractical to stuff it in the car with all our things, tacky to leave it behind for… Read More ›
Memoir
Broken clouds
What little light from this, these broken clouds.
The last of the daily monastic offices
I got up and drank coffee, cooked bacon, went back to bed. I lay on the sofa with my face against the leather and the pale mid-morning light, the sound of blues music and the cat mewing, the laundry machine,… Read More ›
When everything matters
It was like I’d just discovered the scale of life, that there was more of it than I could ever consume.
Song for late autumn Saturdays
A voice is wailing from the radio, an opera, in a language I don’t understand. The gray today is like a palm pressing down on my head or worse, a pillow. One kid is in the shower with the radio… Read More ›
Removed
I can still remember the first Sony Walkman head phones and how it felt when the metal frame slipped out and rubbed against my temples. I didn’t care, it still felt like magic. The Police had come out with their… Read More ›
Norwegian wood
He turned bowls made out of reclaimed wood from the dead or fallen trees, the Norwegian maple from a cemetery reformed in the shape of a bowl Dawn picked out; we’d find a special place for it in our home…. Read More ›
One remembrance
We dropped down into Denver, the lights below, the wisps of cloud and snow, a funny time of year to visit. A time you wouldn’t unless you had to, the passing of my brother-in-law Chip, a celebration of life at… Read More ›
Sunday night with the tree
And I wondered what it thought of all this ornamentation and this fuss: this cruel ending.
All of us
How many selves do we get?