A few years ago, a friend of mine was compelled to downsize as she moved from her cottage and asked if I would relieve her of a large dictionary and its slope-topped table. I said I would pick it up and did so in a matter of a few days. I was thankful; she was thankful. It is a Random House Unabridged Dictionary, 1966, with many reprint dates over the years. It measures 9 ½ inches by 12 and is 3 ½ inches thick. Too thick to grasp on the run. Not the OED, but … Continue reading The Weight of Words by Fred Wilbur→
Lissy is already dressed, her dolls arranged next to the bed in the space that is sometimes a boat, sometimes a park, and often a doctor’s office. The toys are all hues, different nationalities, from newborn to school-age, with sizes that don’t really make sense when placed next to each other. The two Barbies, who were inexpertly gifted to my daughter, live in the closet. Their boo-zooms, career ensembles, and matching footwear are of no interest to the kindergartner. “Hello, little girl!” I say. “Hello, little mother,” she smiles. “Whoa, why does Susan have all … Continue reading Complicity—A True Fiction Of Now by Erika Raskin→
“I choose to take photos because I liked the idea of being able to stop time for a moment,” says Rhode Island photographer Kate Salvi. “I live with anxiety and manic depression so being able to stop for a minute and focus on something beautiful that takes me away from my thoughts is very intoxicating.” When she was twenty-two, Salvi was given a Canon camera by her mother who appreciated … Continue reading New Photography by Kate Salvi→
In the pre-dawn morning, thirty-six hours before my daughter’s wedding, she enters my bedroom. Her flashlight beam wakes me. Good heavens. Half awake, I wonder, is Tempe looking for a necklace? In the dark bedroom, she whispers, “Marcos’s mother didn’t make it.” She’s waking me up to tell me the mother of her fiancé died that morning. Marcos’s aunties reached him in the pre-dawn from Toronto General Hospital. His mother’s unexpected death a day and a half before the rehearsal dinner. I can’t believe it. His mother and I planned to do the “mother’s dance” … Continue reading With a Little Help From My Friends by Trudy Hale→
For many years my photography was travel-based, focusing on ghost towns and other places in glorious decline. Decay and rust attracted me because of their fabulous color gradients often found in very spectacular light, mainly out west in the Great American desert. Over time, I also became interested in spontaneously occurring subjects of funky material that might be broadly considered to pass for abstract modern art. Outside travel for me then intermittently morphed into a visit to an outdoor museum. The intensive targeted micro forage of a limited area became my modus operandi. This … Continue reading The Eclectic Photography of William C. Crawford→
Long, long ago when I was young, someone I knew told me how much it meant to her to read Candide. In fact, she read it over and over. It was inspiring. I wanted to say, “Are we talking about the same book?” How could the deep cynicism I’d seen in that book be inspiring? But she was old and I was young, so, instead of arguing, I filed for future reference. Then there’s this story, perhaps a koan, I first heard at one of those self-help meetings so popular in that same era. It … Continue reading Candide’s Garden by Susan Shafarzek→
So, pretty much every old saw about old age is 100% true. There’s crepitus (the medical onomatopoeia-ous description of creaky joints), and the inevitable geriatric bitch sessions where individualized assaults on the body are compared in groups of two or more, (except, of course for the unmentionable issues which are unmentionable for a reason); and the whole-scale disappearance of words from mental dictionaries (though, thankfully adjacent synonyms seem to hang on longer.) There also seems to be a universal consideration of undertaking the massive Swedish Death Cleaning to free heirs from the unpleasant chore down-road. … Continue reading Night, Night Sleepy Heathen by Erika Raskin→
If you make a quick on-line search about loneliness in America, you may be surprised that between twenty to thirty-three percent of the population feels lonely every week. There is a myriad of causes for this condition which I am not qualified to delve into as my sociological skills are suspect, but phrases like depression, political angst, feed-back bubble, frustration with technology, uncertainty, isolation, and others, are all thrown around with rabbit-hole parsing. I wouldn’t know where to begin knitting together all the nuance of psychiatric terminology. I have been living alone and thinking about … Continue reading Journal of Absence by Fred Wilbur→
I know at least four Virginia poets with books published this year so it seems timely to recommend some fall reading, gifting, or perhaps simply to raise awareness of our local bards. There is also the matter of reverence for place and all writing that is a reflection of our chosen hill, where our consciousness plays out, our miracle of aliveness, our thousands of breakfasts and tying of shoelaces. There is also, I confess, a splash of self-promotion. That said, I hope this list leads at least a few people into the mystery of one … Continue reading Local’s Corner by Sharon Perkins Ackerman→
Years ago, before I decided to bite the bullet and embrace the soul crushing rejection that often goes with Being A Writer, I decided to try my hand at substitute teaching. I realized my mistake almost immediately. Part of the problem was Miss T., a school secretary who’d call before the sun rose to line-up her fill-ins. She scared the hell out of me. And not just because she carried herself like a linebacker. Shed done an on-the-spot personality assessment to determine how best to keep me in her stable—correctly settling on a combo of … Continue reading The Wrong Turn On My Career Path, From Which I’m Still Recovering A Quarter Century Later by Erika Raskin→
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