Let’s Bake Peace

Let’s Bake Peace

When my mother died five years ago from throat cancer, we had been estranged for many, many years. For the first time since her death I have been working through our history by writing a memoir about our relationship for my MFA program. As a person of faith, it’s...

A Letter to My Blog

Dear Blog, Don’t look at me like with your blank, white face staring back at me. I know you exist. I know my role – I’m supposed to show up occasionally and write on you. Regularly, you say? Regularly show up and write on you? I’m sorry to break this to you, but it...
Coming Full Circle

Coming Full Circle

I ran away from the church of my youth in my teen years when I failed to see (or hear) a meaningful message behind all the robes, formal prayer and liturgy, which seemed to represent something shallow and dead. I failed to see spiritual and transformed lives...
Writing Without Excuses

Writing Without Excuses

And so the second year in my MFA begins. I had a brief, very brief, respite from my first year to the beginning of my second year, if you count reading three books, writing a draft of a creative non-fiction manuscript for residency workshops, and reading workshop...
Macedonia – Part Two

Macedonia – Part Two

While visiting Kenzie in Macedonia, we had a chance to share a meal with one of his friends who served in the Peace Corps there ten years ago and married a Macedonian woman. For a few years, Jeb and Kristina moved back to the States and lived in Wyoming. But when they...