I’ve been sleeping on couches recently. Family couches and friend couches. Usually someone offers me a bed or an inflatable mattress at least. But still I choose the couch. I like the chance, when I get it, to fall asleep in the middle of something. I like falling asleep to the gentle voices of other […]
blog
some ideas
I went to Aspen
And it had the nicest public restrooms I’ve ever used in my life. (Close second goes to Santa Barbara California.)
Sleep patterns
I am not a back sleeper but for two months I slept like a corpse. On my back, arms crossed. If I needed to change things up maybe I would cross my legs at the ankles. It came surprisingly naturally to me. Maybe because I was so tired or maybe because we somehow find a […]
Pain scale
The doctors want to know: what’s your pain on a scale of one to ten? So you try to calibrate your scale. Nine and ten are unspeakable. Seven and eight, numbers you might actually use if you felt like you were dying. Like the time you got mono and strep at the same time in […]
Horcrux
I asked a lot of questions at my first post-op. Can I hike? Can I swim? Can I ride my bike inside? The answers: sure, tentatively yes, actually I would just wait. No bikes, no scooters, no skateboarding. (I’m flattered that I look like someone who skateboards.) Let your scar fully heal. Just don’t fall. […]
Dream deferred
When I lived in Spain I taught English lessons to one of the French teachers, Javier, and his son Yann. The lessons happened at their kitchen table, at which Yann truly struggled to remain seated for the whole thirty minutes. When Yann left Javier and I would usually just chat in English. I learned a […]
Calendula
Delia picked me a bouquet of flowers from the backyard. It’s Calendula. It’s good for healing wounds, she said. You can eat it. Or you can dream with it. So I’m expecting dreams of orange and pink.
Overshare?
I spent a lot of last year not really on social media. And not really writing this blog. Which begs the question: where have I been? A few days ago an old friend told me to come visit them in Vermont, thinking that I was still nearby in New York City. And I realized that […]
Time off
What makes the difference between a trip and an adventure? It is the length of the journey? Or the space between you and home? Are adventures built from no cell phone reception? Or from sleeping on the ground? Or from not knowing what’s next? From being lost–or at least feeling lost? I went away last […]
When it’s as good as you can get it
This is the answer I get when I ask: when am I done with my book? When it’s as good as you can possibly get it. Well, never then. I can edit forever. So I need to figure out some other kind of guideline. Maybe it’s done when I stop carrying my idea notebook with […]
Anne Foster 