Twelve years ago, I was a stay at home mom and a part time college student. I was out painting on the back porch with my toddler, living the isolated life of the American mother. My husband called and told me to turn on the television. Soon after, I did the only thing I could…
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A few weeks ago a friend of mine (one of the few beautiful people that still mail things) sent me a photograph clipped from the newspaper. It was of a six year old boy in Syria carrying a rifle nearly as tall as himself. The boy looks quite cheerful, actually, walking with great confidence in…
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My inbox sees a lot of struggle–writing that the world should read, stories that are unfolding now in the heads of people you ought to know. People who can’t remember how to love themselves because disgust with who they became spreads like spilled ink over the story of their lives they are trying to rewrite.…
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So instead of writing this is what I did to close out the day. I dig it. Captain Dougie’s Log
I’ve just finished this brilliant book of poems, Black Aperture by Matt Rasmussen. Anyone who’s been in a writing group with me in the past couple of weeks has heard about it. The poems are startling with their clarity, and the duality of their familiarity and originality. I love them. I finished the collection today…
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Heading from one long week into another, and somehow hoping that I’ll get the chance to write more than I did last week. I have been in this deep period of reading–new poetry that I’ve come across by accident, non-fiction, novels (I feel like it’s been years since I read this many novels), but…
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I’ve had four writing groups this week that were extraordinary and bursting with talent and honesty. Yesterday TWO people arrived with poems they had written outside of group and shared them–not just with me, but with everyone. There was this sense, as we sat around the table, of a genuine safe creative space created with…
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We had a weekend of basically doing nothing special. The kids were off last week, living my childhood–Shark on a trip with my mom, Hurricane in Baltimore with my aunt and uncle, being thoroughly spoiled. And then finally we were back together, which was such a relief. We drank coffee (some of us with enormous…
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The other day I was talking to a workshop participant about the importance of process notes–literally writing about writing–what you were trying to achieve, what was happening around you as you were doing it, what feelings it brought up. And then awkwardly, I realized that I’ve been letting my own process notes habit slip. As…
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Every so often I have this moment of absolute clarity about how little I actually know. It happens with alarming frequency. Often the barrier of delusion my ego has built is strong enough that I don’t have to do anything about it, it just bounces off. But sometimes I can’t deny it; it punctures that…
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