She lay on the pavement as the sun rose, her eyes present and wild. She gasped and her tongue hung loosely from her open mouth as she bled out. Her spindly legs twitched and she uttered faint sounds, a mule deer’s death rattle. Tufts of fur were strewn along the road for thirty feet where … [read more]
Narrative
How To Do It
Natalie Goldberg instructs us to, in the beginning, simply keep our hands moving, whether with pen in hand or two hands quivering over a keyboard, no editing allowed, not even punctuation or correcting spdrelling, just keep moving, don’t stop, even if you haven’t an idea, just go…if all you can come up with is … [read more]
Hamburger Creed
I’m no gourmet. I grew up on fish sticks for Friday dinners, waffles, pan-fried chicken, creamed peas and potpies. I understand a little about good cuisine, but like with wine, where I am very clear what I prefer but know little about it, I am hopeless when it comes to having the encyclopedic knowledge of … [read more]
L.A. and Ellroy
I love LA. Not many admit to such a thing. It is orthodoxy to hate Los Angeles north of the 405 and east of the 101. I saw Joni Mitchell at Dorothy Chandler in March of 1974, with Tom Scott, Max Guerin, Robben Ford and Max Bennett. Joni confessed her love of LA and from … [read more]
Doing Just This One Thing
I don’t think anyone twisted my arm in the business environment and forced me to adopt the misguided notion of “multi-tasking”, which first showed up on the business landscape in 1965, referring to the capabilities of an IBM System/365 computer. Someone thought it wise that we emulate machines. We can’t count on the corporate world … [read more]
Thank you!
(This is an image I made almost ten years ago, outside Hangzhou, PRC, in Zhejiang Province, west of Shanghai, at a wonderful temple called Lingyin Si, set next to Xi Hu, or West Lake, one of the most beautiful spots in China. This is a Chan temple established in 328 CE, a century before Bodhidharma. … [read more]