“What is the single best thing a person can do for tomorrow’s world?” –Richard Powers That’s the burning question that drives most of my days. How can I best serve the Earth and her beings? Climate change continues to rage, and racial injustice is calling for us to rise. But our days also demand that we tend to the people in our lives–including ourselves. One of my jobs is to shepherd this new book of mine out into the crazy … Continue
Category Archives: Writing
I’m thinking so much about my father this weekend. He died from complications of Alzheimer’s disease in 2012. Although he couldn’t win that battle, until the end of his life, an abiding point of pride was the time he spent as a very young man in the Army during World War II. Whenever he encountered another veteran, he’d say, “I met another old soldier today.” Before dementia had a name and a power over him, a gathering power, an ominous … Continue
In this new year, I’m excited about the upcoming publication of I Have Been Assigned the Single Bird, my latest book, and about my work as the incoming President of the Friends of St. Vincent National Wildlife Refuge. More on this soon! But for opening my heart, I’m counting on Asa. Two weeks ago, Jeff and I traveled to Los Angeles to meet our 3-day-old grandson. The sleep habits of a newborn generally don’t align with those of his parents, … Continue
Out on the beach, I found these two remembrances of lives gone by: a Gulf fritillary butterfly, short-stopped on its fall migration, and a fragment of very old pottery (most likely made of the red clay in my bioregion). Barnacles had built a home on what once had been an ancient pot. I placed these beautiful remnants side by side, considering their messages of impermanence and beauty. Today, in many spiritual traditions, we honor our ancestors, and perhaps we feel their presence more closely in … Continue
June 23, 2016 Yesterday I spent 9 hours witnessing a public hearing held in Eastpoint, regarding a second hunt of Florida black bears. While it was in many ways a very anxious day for me, I was absorbed and impressed with the speakers (I was Speaker # 66 and there were several dozen more behind me). I didn’t anticipate our collective courage and brilliance. When I first made a pitch to this Commission, in 1984, regarding a nongame wildlife program … Continue
I am a person of the coast, although much of the year I live 30 miles inland. I can sometimes feel deprived when I’m not down at the edge, where all is clear to see. Beginning on winter solstice 2014, I began a practice of observing and meditating on the comfort of the annual cycles of sunlight, wherever I am. My own home has become a tiny Stonehenge, a still place to receive the light. On the winter solstice in … Continue
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Retreat
The strange business of writing requires more time sitting still than I enjoy. At home I can distract myself with laundry, food prep, family errands, or picking up the house. Almost anything seems more urgent than the desk work I say I want to do. Thus, the writers’ retreat. I’m wrapping up six days at the Bowers House in northern Georgia. There’s nothing within walking distance except a dollar store, post office, and a very old abandoned jail house. … Continue
Friends, something a little different today! I am guest blogger on one of my sister’s sites, called Jungle Red Writers. They bill themselves as “7 smart and sassy crime fiction writers dish on writing and life. It’s The View. With bodies!” Check them out at http://www.jungleredwriters.com/ Bobbie (aka Roberta Isleib) (aka Lucy Burdette) and I, have been writing together since we were toddlers. It took a while to figure out what we wanted to say, but we know, now! … Continue
3:15 pm, March 20, 2015 It’s spring equinox, almost to the minute. For north Floridians, that means maximum flowering (azalea, fringe tree, dogwood, buckeye, wild iris, columbine); maximum birdsong (parula warbler, goldfinch, brown thrasher, cedar waxwing); and unprecedented pollen. Birth and creation in so many forms! Beauty abounds! I personally am experiencing a full measure of spring fruition and joy. Five boxes of Coming to Pass were just delivered to our home by my friend, the UPS man. The creation … Continue
The writing of Coming to Pass: Florida’s Islands in a Gulf of Change began on October 22, 2007, when I inscribed a fat black journal with a single word–COAST–and then cut out pictures to decorate it. I didn’t know what this book would become back then. In 2007, I was trying to reconcile my roles. Mother and stepmother to three sons growing out and away. Daughter of an aging father needing a good deal of my help. … Continue