We look to the light, this time of year. We feel the shortness of the days, the darkness of the cold nights, the bite of the winter wind. We know to our ancestral bones that the sun is reluctant to spend much time gazing on us in December. We huddle inside, where it’s warmer, we […]
Why I Love Being a Writer
Lists are great. Lists can keep you organized, remind you of your priorities, or prevent you from making a faux pas (by forgetting to invite Aunt Myrtle to the birthday party, for instance). They help you remember to pick up yogurt at the grocery story, and they can show you how many more editing changes […]
Songwriting Sparks at the Bluebird Café
The Bluebird Café in Nashville has a storied past, as die-hard country music fans will tell you. Not being one of those, I hadn’t heard of it before this past weekend. Shame on me. The Bluebird Café is a tiny little “listening room” tucked into an unassuming strip mall, far from the noise and neon […]
Writers Have Keen Observation Skills – Or So I’ve Heard
Keen observation skills. That’s pretty much an essential quality for a writer, right? We observe setting. We observe atmosphere. We observe human nature. We observe conflict and emotion and irony. But boy, I’d be lousy as a crime scene witness. Detective: “Can you describe the perpetrator?” Me: “Um. I think it was a white guy.” […]
Burnt Offerings – Hiking through a Wildfire-Ravaged Forest
Here I am, hiking through a burned forest. It’s been less than a year since the East Troublesome Fire tore through 193,812 acres of Colorado mountain forest, destroying 580 structures, 366 of which were homes. With 80-mile-per-hour winds, that fire ripped through miles-long swaths of Rocky Mountain National Park, roiled down mountainsides to the very […]
Inspiration, That Flighty Kitten
Inspiration, That Flighty Kitten by Kelley J. P. Lindberg Inspiration, that flighty kitten,is hard to keep to task.The world is so full, after all,of shine and color and ripplingsun-sparkles on fast-moving water,drawing all six sensesin every direction away.If I depend on her to getanything done, this page will remainopaque as white pixels.It’s up to me, […]
