Caterpillars Go Marching

I can’t remember who noticed them first. From far away they looked like a crack in the pavement, or maybe a stick. But then someone crouched down, and then the rest of us did, and the crack or stick or trick of the light turned into a line of caterpillars. They came one after the […]

Penspective: Looking up

This post ran a few springs ago, in appreciation and imitation of Craig’s ‘penspective’ series, but with less effective photography. Spring seems like a wonderful time for cloud-spotting here. Last week, there was an amazing lenticular cloud in the shape of a cigar. I didn’t have my pen with me, but I can still remember […]

Tomato Tomato

Last week I read a delightful story about seed catalogs that made me remember this 2012 post. And my seed catalogs! Somewhere along the way, I must have gotten off the catalog lists because not a single one has arrived this winter to help me dream of spring. (Where did I go wrong?!) For now, […]

On the occasion of a century

My dad’s 100th birthday would have been this weekend. 100! It seems incredible—so many years since 1923, so many things that happened in them. How different it must have been, how many things might have been not so different at all.   These are the things I think I remember that he told me: behind […]

After the Rain

It is still January, but the plants here don’t seem to know it. The evergreen pear trees along my street burst into flurries of cloud-colored blossoms last weekend. Along my neighbor’s garage, the hedgehog aloe shows off its orange flowers. Elsewhere, there are fingerprints of the recent storms’ destruction: beaches scoured of sand, roads crumbling […]

Number the Days

It is me again, with my hopeful calendars! I originally wrote this post in January 2020, when the calendar did seem like a place where you could write something on a certain date and there would be a reasonable chance that it would come to pass. I feel much more timid now, three years on. […]

Plunge

            I’m time-traveling back to early 2021, when finding pool lane reservations was as tricky as scoring Taylor Swift tickets. For the last few months, I’ve been happily swimming at a pool that I can go to almost any time and find an open lane. Swimming bliss! And then yesterday I found out it will […]

Time Will Tell

Yesterday was the end of Daylight Saving time here, also called “The Day That Just Won’t End” by assorted family members and friends. So I’ve been thinking about time and watching this frightening movie trailer again. Other times, it’s good when time feels more expansive than it usually does. Even though this post first appeared […]