My Own Story
How does my story compare to that of anyone else’s? Why do I ask? Why do I care? Well, singer/songwriter/author Tori Amos started me on this path today. I recently read her second book, Resistance: A Songwriter’s Story of Hope,…
Mom Planted Petunias
I’ve started questioning reality. Every turn around the Internet block makes me feel like I’m in the fiction stacks of my local library, where I’m picking books at random, reading a few pages, then placing each back on the shelf…
Highwire
What happens when you live life in a state somewhere between denial and acknowledgement, halfway between peace of heart and frustration with every aspect of the world around you? It is a precarious perch, and one wrong move can plunge…
Peaks and Valleys
At the end of The Lord of the Rings, Frodo says to Sam, “Do not be too sad, Sam. You cannot always be torn in two. You will have to be one and whole, for many years.” My mind continually…
Little Wins
My thoughts are turning again to photography and art. I press buttons on my camera, push virtual sliders on my computer, then pick up my phone, and hit the + icon on Instagram. The wooden box holding 120 shades in…
Which Color?
A black and white world has its allure, as nuance, like freedom, involves responsibility, but black and white gets monotonous—and, besides, there are still more than fifty shades of grey. Saying yes to color takes courage: Adobe RGB offers 16.7…
The Terrifying Power of Words
I sometimes wonder if I fill my world with too many words: the ones on the screen, on the page, on my tongue, in my ear. Banishing some might me do me good, but which ones? It’s not as straightforward…
Purpose
I am searching for the truth. Isn’t it funny that the hundreds of thousands of words I’ve strung together and the millions of words I’ve read come down to nothing more than that?