Reflections on the small things, and the big ones, that impact our day-to-day lives.
I know It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll . . .
In the Canary Islands, descendants of an aboriginal people called the Guanches communicate via an ancient whistling language. As Diane Ackerman eloquently tells it in A Natural History of the Senses, “They trill…
Lazy Hazy Days
Midsummer night: I stand outside on my deck, stare up at the moon through the trees, follow the music. To the left I tune into the percussive cicadas, to the right a chorus…
A Piece of Paradise
Sometimes I wonder if it was the image that came first, not the word. The link between the two is intrinsic, a chicken-and-egg conundrum that rests more on riddle than solution. Both have…
Grace Notes
In Leonard Cohen’s Book of Longing, the most recent of his collections, there’s a poem, “My Guitar,” that takes its shape as a drawing, one of many that stand alone or as illustrations…
Land of Dance
I love to dance; my husband has a bum ankle. So I played the ‘do-it-for-us’ card and signed up for a series of ballroom dancing classes at our local Fred Astaire studio. Loosen…
Breaking the Chain
A friend of mine forwards an e-mail to me, Subject: Keep her going – hilarious! I quickly scroll through the body of the e-mail, a series of photos that would bring a smile…
