Archive for the 'Meditations' Category

Writer Imperatives 101: Let Them In

I don't recall learning to read, but I know I was still pretty young when I first started retreating to my room to read. I remember Robinson Crusoe, The Chronicles of Narnia, and A Wrinkle In Time, looking up words in my paperback dictionary, and basically sealing my fate as a book nerd for the rest of my life. It
Read more…

Thoughts on Beauty, Joy, and Suffering: an Easter Reflection

It's a glorious spring day here. The birds are serenading the sun as it warms the grassy marsh beneath the berry vines with their new bright green growth, reaching up, creating new perches. I open the door and let in the warm breeze, the first of the new year. And a glorious discovery wafts in: here, the Pacific northwest, spring
Read more…

Ice Cream, Writers Websites, & Making Your Calories Count

Tillamook ice cream is one of the true pleasures of our moving to Portland. I know I risk outing myself as a closet ice-cream freak, but I don't care. The way they pack so much lactocine goodness into every delicious spoonful is enough to make me want to move here all over again, just to have the pleasure of realizing
Read more…

How Authors Get Everything They Really Want: The Death of Traditional Publishing “Success”

What is “success” as an author? This question has more answers than Carter has pills. (My grandpa liked to say this, which always made me feel badly for whoever Carter was. Who is Carter and why does he have so many pills?) Ah, this is great. I'm munching some popcorn Charlotte, my 5 year old, just brought me from her
Read more…

How to Write What Matters

People still ask if I'm doing okay and I tell them I've never been happier. Sure, we're starting to recognize the gray insides of the silver lined clouds, but mostly, we're amazingly okay despite my decision not to return to analog publishing.  Speaking of old publishing, feast your eyes on these libraries. Oh, where will we bookies be in 20
Read more…