2 Trips

Woman in white sweater packing clothes in the luggage bag

My oldest daughter loves to pack for trips.

I asked her what’s so great about it, and she said, “It makes me think about what I need, so I think about being there, and so it’s like I’m already there.”

Not bad, kid.

If we think about packing as visualizi… Read more...

The Uncertain Years

The most difficult form of parenting to deal with as a child is when the caregiver is inconsistent in their behavior.

Psychologists say this leads to a ‘disorganized attachment style’ for the child. In other words, the child is unable to predict the behavior that’… Read more...

First Breaths of the Morning

Serene frosty morning landscape with sunrise

I woke into a groggy half-sleep with a pain in my chest.

Seduced by the warmth of the covers and the elusive intoxication of drowsiness, I convinced myself that the best thing to do was to stay put and do some deep breathing.

I breathed in and out, and in my sleep-stupor, I imagine… Read more...

All Them Moons

Three clothespins on clothesline

As I take in the trash cans for the billionth time, a general malaise washes over me, and I wonder if it’s this moment in time we’re in.

Uncertainty, everyone says. What’s next? And the people in the control tower tell us, once again, to hold on while the ship go… Read more...

we be illin’

Courage

It was feminists who had the courage to diagnose the world around them, to take the glaring light that was shining on them and turn it around to blind their accusers.

“We are not the problem,” they said, tired of being labeled anxious, depressed, hysterical. “We … Read more...

I Feel Like

I feel like the villains are scheming to blow up the planet from their rocketship, and I’m trapped in a basement tied to a sewer pipe.

I feel like someone cut off my hands, and they’re laughing at me through the walls.

I feel like the bomb shelters were not dug deep eno… Read more...

Layovers & Empty Glasses

Fluid pouring in pint glass

We tend to strive for the other side of our achievements.

A clean in-box
An empty desk
The celebration after the speech
The exhale after the test

But then, we get there, to the other side, and after the euphoria subsides, we tend to resent the emptiness and crave the clutter again.

In… Read more...

Anxiety

Grayscale photo of chair inside the establishment

Anxiety is a trapped THOUGHT in a straight jacket banging against the walls of your mind, trying to get out.

It’s relentless, constantly moving, and doesn’t care what time it is.

When the outside world gets quiet, the banging and slamming and SCREAMING get louder.

The mo… Read more...