The Other World

Writing helps me feel connected to the world. Grounds me. Helps me feel that I'm doing a good job living this life.

If there's a season for everything, then it's been a season of more endings than I'm used to. Some expected. One very much not. 

To Peter, Dodie, Shera who was supposed to visit next week, my sister's friend Freya... and, yes, our dog Magic, I offer Walt Whitman...  Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes. 

I offer that to the rest of us, too. Let us be good stewards of our universes, including the ones we create in our writing.

...I'm picturing Peter on a porch with a cigar, Dodie curled up with a book of Emerson, Freya is away checking her kids... and Shera reads on the dock with Magic at her side... 

Homeward Unbound

If I were in junior high I'd have an answer to What I Did Over Summer Vacation - found home. The last month has been the East Coast from Massachusetts, New York City, Philadelphia, D.C., the Gulf Coast of Florida, then back to Washington State. Where's home? Massachusetts where I've lived most of my life? This new pacific place? Neither. For me, home travels. Like a good book.

Huh?

A good book takes us on a journey, but the core of the novel keeps us grounded. We might not know where the novel is taking us, but, with good writing and a strong core we know we'll arrive where and how we need to be.

For me, that's home, something inside that keeps me going forward and knowing that, to borrow from John Kabat-Zinn, wherever I go, there I am. And if there's a cafe, a view of the ocean and some family, even better.

Writing-wise, much has happened the last month, starting with two hours of writing most vacation mornings. And how cool that Elana Johnson has taken us on her journey of POSSESSION publication.

It's great to be back. What's your home?