Tag: writing
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Weekend Update
Saturday began with tea while grocery shopping, though my favorite barista wasn’t there and this one made my dirty chai very dirty!! Back home, I watered plants and tried to set up Alexa while my landlord, Slie, and the handyman, Sergio came. Sergio took the whole oven out and replaced the part he’d been waiting…
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Some Finer Details
The weather in Cape Town is quite unpredictable. It can go from sunny to cloudy to drizzly to stormy and back again in a matter of hours. It is also quite windy here, except in the bays protected by the mountains, like Camps and Clifton and Bantry. On Beach Road where I am, the palm…
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Tuesday’s Tales
Again, some random pieces of information from today… If I die in South Africa, it won’t be from any of the horrible safety report reasons I read about before coming. It will be trying to escape my house if there’s a fire because I can’t get my dang skeleton keys to work! I’m hankering something…
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Saturday in Pretoria
My first weekend in Pretoria and time to explore a bit while doing some errands. Today I took to the highways and felt totally comfortable. I only hit my wipers instead of my blinkers twice today, instead of every single time like most days! (They’re reversed.) Traffic lights are called robots and at the red…
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Animals and More
Today’s post is mostly about animals. I have some answers thanks to my local colleagues. The other day I mentioned my bird app and also that I may or may not have a pteradactyl fly over my house on the regular. I heard that same bird call while the three of us were meeting the…
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Writefully Hers
Not long after my mom passed away, I felt an urge to commit myself to writing and began an almost daily ritual of doing so. I also knew I wanted to share this passion with other women, so one day over lunch at my house, I told my friend Katie about my plan to start…
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Beach Boys
Moving to another country for two years is exciting, but it is also hard. It means saying goodbye to good friends and family. It means long distance and long gaps in get togethers. It means time differences and phone logistics. It means being a mom from afar, which I’ve done before, but not because I…
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SADurday
Today I am sad.I don’t need to be cheered up.I don’t need to look at the bright side.I don’t need to get busy and distract myself.Today I am sad.And I want to be.My youngest has left,pulled away in her little “Bean” carpacked to the gills with her bags,clothes, new bedding, new pillows,a case of water,…
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Too Many Tabs
“Want to do a May Challenge?” my friend texted me at the end of April. She loves doing plank, push up or dietary challenges and always tries to rope me in for accountability (or because misery loves company, as I often counter!). “Friend,” I responded, “May IS the challenge!!”May was progress checking in the form…
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Silence and Screaming
“There are many days I thirst for my own silencebut walk through the desert screaming instead” ~Andrea Gibson, “Queer Youth Are Five Times More Likely To Die By Suicide,” You Better be LightningI crave stillness and peace and silence,yet my mind is screaming and streaminga busy, noisy, staticy binge,until I let my body take the…
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Somewhere Right Now
Somewhere, right now, a woman is walking on cushiony clouds, each step bouncy and alive because a first date turned into a second and a third is in the books. Right now, she texts him to say she’ll bring dinner and writes a magazine-worthy description of his choices. “I just don’t feel like a woman…
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Writefully Hers
They arrive,singly or in pairs,with hugs and baked goods,shedding outerwear andcongregating in my kitchen,catching up, enjoying snacks,choosing their tea,always the tea.Eventually this tribe of writersmoves to the couches,tucked in hip to hip,shoulder to shoulder,around the coffee table,before the fire,beginning the night by sheddingthe burdens of the day or week,relieving the mind of what is pressing,and…
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Timed Writings
I like to do a writing exercise with my students where I give them a prompt and an allotted amount of time to write. No editing, no revising. Just power to the pencil without stopping. If they pause, I tell them to ask themselves, ‘What else?’ I love doing this activity myself. Here is what…
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The Gift of Writing
She beamed at me when I walked into the room. “This is so exciting!” she proclaimed, and throwing her blankets back, she continued, “We have much to do to get ready for the baby. Where shall we start?” My 89 year old mother was in her final days of life, in hospice care. She was…
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The “Write” Tool
Sometimes a barrier to writing is as simple as not having the right tools. I like to play by experimenting with different implements. Sometimes I like the feel of a scratchy pencil across the page. Recently I’ve discovered the marvel of erasable pens. Color helps me organize and emphasize. Colored, erasable pens are a game…
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A Map of My Hand
My life story can be told using a map of my hand. I start with the obvious…the scars. There are the stitches I got when I was 8, on the inside of my middle finger and at my wrist. My fingers were bent as a child, and surgery straightened them, but left its mark. Years…
The Journey Inward 