This particular column and I have been dancing partners for many months. We have tangoed and waltzed together, and I dare say met each other on painful ballet tippy toes. This column is precious to me because it’s the closing number on what has been a very powerful ocean of […]

Just when I think I’ve lost my way, life gives me a little something to work with and the clear message that I need to take a deep breath and step outside of what I think is safe. Sometimes I just have to believe. I was sitting in a local […]

Sometimes writer’s block is an unexpected and unsavory visitor in my neck of the woods. And yet when it arrives, I am compelled to welcome that dried-up guest honorably. It is usually clearing me out for some new delight. Last week it happened to be cookies. Of course, I ate […]

I ruminated for six days on the contents of this column and came up empty-handed. I went to bed on it, woke up on it, and still nothing. I installed the ritual chocolate and black tea (the best combination since Saturday and Sunday) that are my known catalysts for inspiration, […]

I’ve always considered myself a “northerner.” I’m a hardy soul at home in the elemental outdoors. I grew up loving the open air of the wilderness—and I still do. I also think I would have made a great pioneer woman in the U.S. Midwest, tending to a small little cabin […]

On Sunday morning, my dad was welcomed in his capacity as CEO of the plastic insulation project that my captain and I were stapling to my old screen porch. My dad is very good at many things, including it would seem, catching my misuse of the English language when he […]

Who knew a gander of geese could put out so much sausage-like material. My neck of the woods suddenly is teeming with great green gobs of goose poop. It is a virtual war zone out there laden with log bombs that make every step a hazard and the bottom of […]

I would much rather be writing a story about cornered skunks and wide-eyed squirrels, and the flurry of cat fur that flies when “Cash” and “Dot” decide to play tag with unwilling members of the animal kingdom around here. But that won’t be happening today, and it won’t be happening […]

There are men who somehow just grip your eyes and hold them hard like a spell and such was he, as he pointed the flashlight in my direction and with inflection, all bundled in woollies and lumberjack red, his face unshaven, said—as I turned my head—“The lady that’s known as […]