writing to survive
unknotting the past and remaking the present one story at a time

A changing selection of the best of the blog

In my dreams, the dead are silent. I’ve never had a good conversation with a single one of them, just offer my apologies, bake the bread, pour the coffee. What is the guilt about? The dead no longer care about my transgressions . . . Prognostication

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The year was marked by the scent of patchouli. It roped and twisted its way into my room, coated the curtains, soaked into my skin. Some pseudo-hippy incense-burning chick with Camarillo brillo hair lived in the room next door and I put up with a lot of unwelcome odors. Pot smoke, sweat masked by scented oils, cigarettes and sandalwood. My least-favorite scent is an amalgam: Fall Term 1987 . . . Shadowplay

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That's me up there, in our office/guest room/exercise space, dressed in full stay-at-home mom regalia. Baggy cropped pants? Check. Shapeless long-sleeved t-shirt? Check. Hair in desperate need of a cut or at the very least a comb? . . . Sweater dress logic

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I found a fully intact bullet while digging in the backyard yesterday afternoon. It’s the second bullet I’ve found by our back fence, though the first one was just part of a casing. Yesterday’s bullet, from a .22 according to my husband, was dented on side . . . Bullets over Berkeley

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If it wasn't frozen, processed, or heavily laced with sugar, my grandmother didn't cook it. I have her old recipe box, which includes many selections from the "Kitchen of Duncan Hines," as well as things like Pow-Wow Sandwiches, English Liver Bake, and salad molds, recipes that are products of the sixties and seventies . . . The intersection of food, love, and memory
updated 12/4/2010