Celebrate a New Writing Center
We invite you to experience a place where you can bury yourself in the quiet of the woods, the lapping shores of a Great Lake, or join in a lively arts community. Continue reading
View ArticleWriting from The Ledge #2
If you’re a writer trying to squeeze time with your creative work around other work, you understand the value of three weeks in a quiet house with a rocky front yard. Continue reading
View ArticleTapping Out the Grief
For ninety minutes a week, the world I experience is a musical place with classic jazz or Broadway tunes accented by the sounds of fourteen tap shoes slapping and flapping and stomping across a studio...
View ArticleShim Sham Shimmy
Adriana introduced the Shim Sham Shimmy to our class at Dancin’ on the Door studio while I was away. A fellow dancer found floor space to bust a move from the recent lesson as she waited tables at the...
View ArticleMy Grandfather’s Face
Urban shoppers might walk away from farmers’ markets in the rural area where I grew up. There’s nothing exotic among the produce displayed. Tomatoes look like those ripening on a backyard vine. A dozen...
View ArticleComplex Joy
The future promises only its best on this night and the past reminds us of what was good. There is joy.
View ArticleAldo Leopold Weekend
March 4, 2017, sixty-nine years after Aldo Leopold penned his final contribution to A Sand County Almanac, a marathon reading of his work begins in a small building called The Schoolhouse in the...
View ArticleRevisionism II
Sunday I carried cold water and a first draft of the new book to the deck and began reading and making notes. Revision launched.
View ArticleRevisionism III
On a sunny, genuine Door County fall morning the house is filled with six writers on retreat. Outside trees are rustling in a definite breeze while inside the furnace and the dog provide the noise. It...
View ArticleKen Follett, Jodi Picoult and Phillipa Gregory
Some authors are like Facebook friends who post about a puppy, a grandchild, a new writing project, a spectacular vacation then disappear for months.
View ArticleThe Gardens Change
Queen Anne’s Lace plants too late to blossom wave dried pods in meadows and along roads. More Goldenrod become dull amid remaining greenery. Creeping vine leaves are tinged with brown, exposing dead...
View ArticleDoor County Late Winter
Three days of bright sun makes a friend’s installation of solar panels look like a good investment. Melting ice sparkles down the rain chain.County baseball league guys hold their initial season...
View ArticlePermanent Marker
Spring through fall events are written in permanent marker on our calendars before Easter. Until this year. A rough schedule is on my desk with April and May crossed off. The calendar remains blank.
View ArticleSeptember Musings
The air feels quiet, not packed with potential. It is easier to look back at the good times of summer than forward at the diminishing weeks until winter.
View ArticleSimple Peace (Appeared on WordSisters Blog)
Sixty-six degrees at eight in the morning on July 4 in Door County. My hands smell of lavender from making bouquets and the harvest piles up in an old, rusty green Suburban Garden wagon. The cold...
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