As most did, I learned to walk at a young age. I never looked back. I’ve always loved walking. “No, you guys go on ahead. I’ll walk.” To be sure, I took this for granted. Some whom I love have lost this ability to walk altogether. The first piece of creative writing I ever did … [read more]
Narrative
The Day the Music Died
The Day the Music Died I was ten. November 22, 1963 Time stopped in the far west at 10:30 am and then again at 11:00 that morning. Though we had only two television channels in our small desert town, the nuns wheeled in sets and tuned in to Cronkite and Huntley and Brinkley and … [read more]
Moving quickly to the end
Moving quickly to the end Kuàzi in Chinese. Hashi in Japanese. We say chopsticks. I love following the words, characters and meanings. Somewhere in this 4,000 year eating utensil history, the characters suggested “quick” and “bamboo”. No Zhongwen scholar, I’ll leave that to others. I like to eat slowly, but I still call my kuàzi … [read more]
Tilt
Happy 23.5 degree Axial Tilt Day! Up here we refer to this as “summer solstice”. My friends in the south call this “winter solstice”. In Ecuador, Singapore or Nairobi, I suppose it is Tuesday. In Colorado and elsewhere, we are as tilted toward the Sun as we get. Then we start to slingshot back the … [read more]
Father’s Day
I learned to drive a manual transmission at twelve or thirteen years old, maybe fourteen, out in the Washington desert with my old man, in a car exactly like this. Usually as the sun set over the channeled scablands of the Columbia Basin. Usually Dad had a tall vodka with ice, neat between his knees. … [read more]
Covid Dharma
Covid Dharma 23 January, 2021 I do my best to toe the line in these covid days. So I rarely start the car, rarely drive the twelve minutes down the 1,700 feet and six miles to people, conversation, culture, comida Mexicana, and gas stations. But I went for a haircut today, fantasized showing up in … [read more]
