Thoughts about writing, and the universe.
There's the kind of talk at the end of the day when you're tired, when everyone's had a day of work and stress and all you want to do is sleep. There's the kind of talk with the friend you're catching up with, sequential and summary, the "did I tell you about this?" the "this... Continue Reading →
I write today from Chicago, where we are quarantining before we visit family. The decision to travel in these times was a difficult one. During the summer, we determined we could not leave Norway. This time, with more information, we made the choice to come, and I pray it was the right one. In my... Continue Reading →
I'm starting to think that anything can be a story. My husband tells me about his job search after college. What a story! I am eating chicken surrounded by forty of the loudest teenagers on the planet. Story! It keeps raining and the pumpkin plant keeps blooming all the same. Story. Quarantined students are roaming... Continue Reading →
In the rush through of this so different summer, at last the rain has broken. Three days of sun erupted miraculously into the forecast, and in a fevered burst we made our travel plans. Covid-19 seems to be controlled in Norway. The country mostly reopened in mid-May, and new case numbers have held low at... Continue Reading →
America has been troubling. The consumer push is thicker than I ever remember, the pressure to buy big and often and right now. Things are far larger than they need to be. It's a difficult relationship, I think, that I've got to my home country. For moments I wish I had been born somewhere else.... Continue Reading →
We made it to Chicago in a quick burst of a day. An overnight in Bergen (you can't get a ferry down there earlier than noon, and with a flight taking off at ten--), a fifty-five minute run through Amsterdam. This morning I wake up in Chicago, the big city, the million voices, the land... Continue Reading →
Following the example of the ancient priest who is said to have travelled thousands of miles caring naught for his provisions and attaining the state of sheer ecstasy under the pure beams of the moon, I left my broken house on the River Sumida in the August of the first year of Jyลkyล among the... Continue Reading →
Sunset above Denmark. Summer is done for me. A week of workshops with colleagues, a week's orientation for new students. The fjord is bursting now with a world-full of teenagers, and they have come loaded down with suitcases and nerves, excitement and their blue-toothed boomboxes, their overwhelmed emails, overwhelming excitement, their homesickness, fledgling independence, their... Continue Reading →
When the train doors open, we can already feel the heat. Nine forty-five, cloudless sky, the second heatwave of the summer sliding leisurely through Europe. We are spending the day in Pompeii. We've taken the train over from Naples, six euros for the express with air conditioning, three euros for the slow train. Last night,... Continue Reading →
It's 10:30pm, and I'm just sitting down to write. I'll have to keep it a quick one. A long and sweaty, beautiful and adventurous day of travel now at an end, I'll recount a bit and reflect, see if I can tease out a few details to remember. Naples has a reputation. I think everyone... Continue Reading →
Words like trees 