I have a Facebook friend named David. He has a pet rabbit and looks a bit like Ira Glass (a look I will admit I admire…) and he voices his opinion on the blog occasionally. I do not know how he became a “friend”, but he seems wise and although we have not spoken of […]

Original Oil (and one of my all time favorites) by Jim Draper   It is rare for me to feel a lack of confidence. Not the passing fancy, I am probably a little old to wear strategically shredded jeans lack of confidence, but the kind of bone-deep uncertainty that stops you in your tracks. I […]

It’s not like I slept all day – yesterday’s walk around Reeds Lake…   Should I be worried? I got my new mattress Saturday. You may be bored with this subject, but think of it like the old adage about the man who was unhappy because he didn’t have shoes until he met someone without feet (sort […]

  For many years I didn’t read the 10 Warning Signs of Alcoholism, because I sort of knew what they were going to say and I was pretty sure it was going to be check, check, check. I also was in denial – Oh come on, what’s the big deal? Who doesn’t drink alone?   My […]

  Lauren was friends with twins in high school. Their father used to introduce them by saying, “These are my daughters. They lie.” I thought it was funny, because he always said it with a resigned, seriousness: as if having teenage daughters who lied was somehow unique and surprising.   The fact is, anyone who […]

I don’t have a mattress. I am sleeping on the Balinese daybed (anyone who has plunked down on it expecting to sink comfortably knows this is self-punishment – it’s stiff as a bed of nails). My king sized bed did not fit in my new apartment and I bought a sleek queen platform, thinking I would […]

I was thinking of those old werewolf movies (the ones before the flattering Twilight series), where an average guy is minding his own business in a dark alley and gets bitten by an infected wolf. He sees a full moon and suddenly hair sprouts from his knuckles, his jaw elongates and he screams as his […]

You know that phenomenon where it seems faster and easier on the return leg of a road trip? I think the same thing applies to moving: I think it’s a lot more fun to unpack than pack. And since I had all my earthly belongings in storage for more than a year, it was simultaneously like Christmas […]

  Tim S told me to be vigilant: moving is the time when established patterns get thrown to the wayside and routines that have kept me sober in the past are subjugated to the unpacking of a hundred boxes (what is all this stuff???). In the past few days I have not felt the desire […]

I had a moment of abject panic this morning. I couldn’t find the small, Louis Vuitton suitcase that I packed with every piece of jewelry I own. The pearls Jonathan gave me when Lauren was born, the Hermes bracelets, the ring I bought myself in St. John as a “divorce present,” everything…  I remembered I took it […]