In my 33rd year, clarity is harder to come by, and grief is given a guest room so it can stay as long as it needs.

There is a plover controversy in Chicago. The plovers are a small thing, but they are so purely good, and it should be so easy for us to take care of them. If we do, that will say something about humanity that is so rarely said: we can make kind and gentle choices, and maybe, in fact, we are wired to.

Our baby chick died. That is part of life. Coming back to life is not normally part of life; so what does one do when it is?

There are many things in my life right that I am waiting to watch grow out.

A whole post written on a treadmill.

“Those old notebooks (plural because, I guess if we’re being honest, there’s also the dream journal I haven’t really done much with; and then that nature / prose book I was going to do little watercolors in) represented a past self. A WORSE self.”

Why we went to Omaha when we had the world at our fingertips.

Maybe this year I will take a holiday from Christmas.

The key to learning how to watercolor is to keep watercoloring. But when that fails, here are a few fool-proof tips.

What would happen if you released the story that you are not good enough just as you are? And why is it so difficult to do?

I know that the praying thing makes a lot of you a little queasy. And this makes sense, because religion has historically been oppressive, exclusionary, or, at best, something to appropriate. But, dangerous as it may be, I’m coming out as someone who prays.

Hey, internet! Here are some of my most recent failures!

A primer for people not actually looking to tune pianos, but who are looking for the deeper lessons that piano tuning might bring a person. Also, I mean, there is SOME information in here on tuning pianos. I wouldn’t call this the end-all-be-all guide, but it’s not NOT useful.