Sometimes poems say everything that needs to be said. Most of what I do today didn't exist when I was in school. What I still use today is the problem solving I learned. How to think, not what to think. And, of course, that art is the heartbeat of a culture. Everything I learned was by feeling my way along in the dark. You and Art Your exact errors make a music that nobody hears. Your straying feet find the great … [Read more...]
Know Your Limits
"Plant in full sun," the tag on the plant said. It added that I could trellis it, but keep the trellis in the sun. The plant was a Manzanita, purchased it at a local big-box hardware store two years ago. Because it was its first year, I didn't plant it in full sun. I planted the Manzanita in a big pot with a small trellis and put it where it got the morning sun and was shaded from the harsher sun of the afternoon. During May and early June, … [Read more...]
Don’t Make Your Worries Archival
When I was a child, my problems were child-size, which means as big as I was. But with two older brothers and parents who had their own problems, sharing mine didn't seem like a good solution. So I would write my worries on strips of blue-lined, rough, tablet paper, tear them up and "hide" them--bury them under a tree. I learned that paper is plant material and rots. I was fascinated at the decomposition of the paper--and, I was sure, my worries. … [Read more...]
The Tricky Part of Forgiveness
Forgiveness is a slippery slope that confuses almost everybody. (OK, maybe just me). What makes it slippery? Because forgiving is often confused with "I accept your apology and now we can pretend that never happened." That might work in some cases, but not in others. Another difficult logic hill to climb, "Thanks for saying you are sorry. But your saying you are sorry does not obligate me to make you feel better. Or to let you continue … [Read more...]
What We See Is . . . Well, it Depends
We had just moved into our Phoenix house and I was busy re-potting plants that had been shipped in the moving van. Six days in the dark, in a closed in moving van in August, and I was delighted that all the plants had made it. As I looked around the backyard, I was pleased to recognize a fig and two palo verdes, an orange and. . . another tree that hadn't fared well lately. It was pretty tired looking. The trees hadn't been watered in a … [Read more...]
The Hard Edges in Life
My father was always studying, taking notes, learning. So much so, that my predominant memory is of the back of his head, bent over a book. He spent each evening reading, studying, working on projects he brought home from the office. At home, his workspace was also our dining room. We knew to clear the table quickly after dinner, slide the table back into the slot in the wall, and leave my father to his work. He was neither a tyrant nor a pal. … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 30
- 31
- 32