With social media and technology what they are, metafiction has become more a part of our lives than ever: we’re constantly stepping outside the frame to capture ourselves in it, and our story of documenting our life story is as much a story as the story itself. But as we step outside the frame, we’re straddling two worlds and cease to exist fully in either — like tourists on an Alaskan whale-watching cruise with our cameras out trying to catch the breaching whales as proof we were there, we miss the reality just beyond our lens and I wonder, did we really see anything at all?
Memoir
The trees could be characters if we only gave them names
A row of arborvitae intended to screen an unseemly RV strip at the edge of our property died; it was really the only thing we lost in the yard but it bothered Dawn to look at: there were seven, in… Read More ›
That one year in Europe
And just like that, it was over. Beth asked the kids if they wanted some eggs for breakfast with toast and jam and they did, and we made small talk, and I reminded them of the time, and they were… Read More ›
Canyon Road bookends
I unrolled the gravity-fed water filter bladder that still smelled like campfire from a year ago, collected a few liters of stream water and hung it from a tree by our camp while Brad finished a cigarette and started a… Read More ›
Deceiver Trail to Far Country Lookout
I took the Deceiver Trail, the S3, past the Licorice Fern cul-de-sac to a crumpled-up viewpoint where there wasn’t much to see but it sounded nice with the water collecting in a dark pool by a leaning sign, Far Country… Read More ›
Sunday’s solemn features
We got back to our vitamins, raw almonds, coconut milk — shopping for the best price on gas, how the clouds cling to the hills on a Sunday morning, the treetops tucked in, gone back to sleep. Even though it’s… Read More ›
Fortune presents gifts not according to the book
That last Tuesday in Germany I had two Xanax I’d saved from the flight last summer and took one when I got back from the artist Matthias’s house, found our place a shit-storm of packing and bad energy and realized Dawn… Read More ›
Fantastic Erratic: on muses, flow, and writing in spurts
When I started blogging, I posted for the first three years without a single visitor, not even my mom. It didn’t matter because, a.) I didn’t really understand (and wasn’t interested in) social media, b.) I didn’t think my writing… Read More ›
Perfect from now on
I got an email from Loren at work complaining about Gilles, the fact he kept walking around Loren and Christine’s apartment in just his bath towel, that it was bumming Christine out as Loren put it — and I pictured… Read More ›
We are all just prisoners here of our own device
I turned right on the N6 past the Klondike Marsh, past Clay Pit Road, past the grate-covered mine shaft, the cave holes shown on the map. I met my hair stylist outside my old building where I worked and we… Read More ›