“They carried all they could bear, and then some, including a silent awe for the terrible power of the things they carried.” ― Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried I sat on the shore, looking out at the Atlantic, and I didn't really know what had brought me there or what I had brought with me. I had … Continue reading the things we carry
"You keep stopping." Ms. Youshiura, my piano teacher of 3 years, nodded towards my fingers, which had stuttered to a halt after messing up the third movement of Clementi's Sonatina Op. 36 in C Major--for the fifth time. Taking in another shuddery wet breath (I was on the verge of tears by this point), I … Continue reading play it through
New recipe. New job. New shoes. New movement. New haircut. New leader. New year. We love beginnings--I love them. There's a giddiness to that first step, leap, and bound. Possibilities ahead, the disappointments of the past cast behind, and you plan and dream for that dewy, shining land stretched before you, waiting to be conquered. … Continue reading do it again, do it again
I saw a spider once. I was 14, absently pushing the lawnmower forward across my front yard, and then I froze. A web hung only inches from my face, suspended between the spiked branches of a fir tree. And there it was--the spider. The size of a glass bead, it watched me with a dozen … Continue reading storm progression
“A man devoid of hope and conscious of being so has ceased to belong to the future.” Albert Camus Last night I committed an act of resistance: I allowed myself to feel. When the hashtags announcing the death of another person of color cease as a trend and become a weekly inevitability, numbness feels like … Continue reading the sisyphus prayer
Our lives cannot be a cosmic To-Do List where we needle ourselves for not doing enough or loving enough. That thinking helps no one, and it is too feckless and feeble to confront injustice or even face our own demons.
graceriot 