So I called Kinko’s today. They know how to spiral bind things, you see, something I, myself, cannot do. And today is the day I must take my thesis to be bound, so that I can take it to the university tomorrow. And tomorrow is only about three or four weeks later than the good […]
Read moreIt’s over now– or almost, anyway. One more event– an exit interview with my professor and the program director– and, possibly, edits after that, and then I’ll have done everything I can do to earn my Master’s degree. It’s been a long time coming. Emma Grace asked me on our way to school the other […]
Read moreAll the miles between us, they say that’s just the way it goesTime is no friend to lovers, stretched like the line that hangs the clothesBut we walk the distance another dayThe rope is thin but does not give wayI can hear the band of angels singin’ nowlike a story from the page is read […]
Read moreAt the back of my copy of Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers, I have a list that I made while reading through the book for the first time. It is a list of words and their page numbers, words I do not know, or am only vaguely aware of but could not, if asked […]
Read moreSo I was at Duke University, enjoying my bi-monthly visit with my professor and discovering, to my Very Real Relief, that the latest excerpt of my Master’s thesis, sent to him last night, is Not Awful. We had a great conversation, and as we sat there grinning over Thomas Mann’s text and profound genius, I […]
Read moreJust in case you wondered, this is what writing my thesis looks like. This: after a full day and a half of reading and writing and reading some more. I left it like this when I went to bed at 11:30 on Saturday night, and– lo and behold!– it was waiting for me on Sunday […]
Read moreIt could have been lonely. This morning I awoke for the second day in a row in an empty house. And by empty I mean without Bill. Without children. Without cat…. Just me, and the three fish in their little tank with the noisy filter– the fish with their three-second memory and no attention paid […]
Read moreWilliam lay on the sofa, fully dressed and ready for the day, but covered with a blanket, resting. It was 6:37 when I came downstairs. “How are you?” I asked, sitting next to him on the sofa’s edge. “Tired,” he said, and smiled sleepily at me. “Mondays are hard,” I said. “Tuesdays are better,” he […]
Read more