Kind De-fusers Blog

The fragrance from my mother’s recipe for cabbages and apples set off a cascade of memories for me, seemingly all at once: my mother’s frustration with the lack of effective kitchen ventilation, resulting in a house that smelled of whatever she’d cooked for supper; childhood nights spent reading on my belly in front of the […]

Everyone said, when you finish the MFA you’ll need a rest. Give yourself a break! Don’t worry about it if you don’t write for a week or two. You deserve it! Relax! But not-writing for a week turned into three weeks, and then bam!, it was three months. So let’s talk about resuming and sustaining […]

My most recent Art of Practice blog post, about some bat-sh^t crazy hate that got flung my way, sparked conversation both public (on FB) and private (in-person and PM); more than twenty people of different ages and life stages gave me positive feedback of one sort or another. And one person sent an anonymous comment […]

I’ve been binging on Muriel Spark the past three weeks: The Girls of Slender Means, A Far Cry from Kensington, Aiding and Abetting, Loitering with Intent, plus her short stories. She’s teaching me a great deal about that ineffable, elusive, all-important element of writing that everyone talks about but no-one can define: voice. The quality of presence formed by words on […]

I’ve been nose to the cliched grindstone since February, working on the required 30+ page essay for my MFA. I ran the gamut of emotion about the essay itself (hated it. feared it. dismissed it. cowered before it. fell in love with it.). And I learned more than I realized I hadn’t known, a terrific […]

  There’s been a group of dedicated volunteers collaborating with my town for at least twenty years, to develop an interconnected trail system. Part of the funding comes from “selling” benches that are placed along the trail–sponsors may attach a plaque in memory or honor of someone. Here’s one:   When I passed by this bench on […]

I was going to write about beauty. I had lofty plans, including references to neuroscience. But yesterday this quote caught my eye: On a day when the wind is perfect, the sail just needs to open and the world is full of beauty. Today is such a day. –Rumi Sara Dobie Bauer’s blog holds a […]

I’m playing with video because, y’know, if a picture is worth a thousand words, a video is worth at least a couple thousand. Includes terrific words on forgiveness by poet David Whyte.

I’ve been a long time away from this blog – almost a year. I let y’all know I was starting a low-residency MFA at Warren Wilson College in January 2016. What I didn’t know was that the MFA work would displace my energy for blog essays. This August, as I start my second semester, familiar […]

It is no secret that my favorite coffeeshop is Bollo’s. It’s my favorite for lots of different reasons: its long, narrow floor plan (I can hide at a back table for productivity, or sit up front for socializing — half the town, the interesting half, comes into Bollo’s). It’s my favorite because of their oat fudge bars, […]