Today, I am beginning my final attempt at writing this story that I have tried to write off and on for nearly 7 years now. It is, I think, a novel, but I won’t know for sure until it is finished. If I can’t do it right this time, I’m giving it up as too…
Many of us are acting as teachers or teaching assistants for our kids these day. Schools are closed and remote learning is the order of the day. We rely on teachers and teachers rely on us. There is a kind of symbiotic relationship here that is new and different from the past. And then, there’s…
I woke up this morning feeling completely unmotivated. I’ve got three requirements meetings scheduled for this afternoon. I’ve run 13 of these meetings over the last couple of weeks, with 9 scheduled this week. And three of them are today. I think part of the lack of motivation comes from working ceaselessly for the last…
There was an amusing item in the New York Times on what famous people’s bookshelves reveal. Whenever I see someone with a book, I have to know what it is. I almost never ask, since I almost never know the person in question, but I usually try to get a view of what it is…
Being a creature of habit in these times has its advantages. Daily routines, regardless of how tedious they are, provide a measure of comfort amidst all of the uncertainty. Take lunch, for instance. One of my all-time favorite lunches is peanut butter and jelly. But after a few weeks of that for lunch, I needed…
I’m the world’s worst bird watcher. I like watching birds every now and then, but I can rarely identify them. It seems like everyone else is aware of the difference between an oriole and a cardinal at a glance, but not me. I like listening to birds, too. Many people can identify the bird by…
I prefer darkness when I sleep: the darker, the better. Rather than accommodate this, the rest of the world does what it can to fill my nights with light. Take my bedroom, for example. Just outside the front of the house where two of our bedroom windows face, is a streetlight, spilling a pool of…
The news lately is unsettling. On some days, I finish the paper hoping the coronavirus pandemic is just a dream that I will wake up from. I know it isn’t, but part of me looks for ways to escape. Thank goodness for books! Opening a book is like opening the lid to an escape hatch.…