Being a dog owner has proved to be one of the most challenging, but extraordinary experiences of my life. When I was lodged in the mud of a toxic relationship, I decided to get a puppy. Ruckus (his all-too-fitting name) became my very best friend in a way that other...
In a few weeks, my husband, daughter and I will move out of the yellow house across from the public library, a house that has been in his family for 75 years. Daisy, now 18, was 2 years old when she nestled into the same bedroom in which her grandmother spent her...
In the dark night of my habits, when sleep avoids me like a troublesome child, I find my life has become a series of other people’s requests, demands, interests and needs. Surely, it’s my fault, all mine, to have put myself on the lowest shelf, deep behind the...
Image: Kurt Vonnegut is one of the many writers from Indiana. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Writers_from_Indiana Writing retreats can be expensive and difficult to schedule. How can busy parent-writers arrange to attend a reasonably priced writing retreat when...
A long, long time ago, when I was in my 20s, in grad school, and then living in Paris, I tried for a while to publish my short stories, poems, essays and one academic paper on the grotesque that my professor thought worthy. (I gave up on the research paper after five...
I teach memoir, but I mostly write poetry. This works well because of the inherent prose lessons in poetry concerning concision, sound, voice, facts and even plot. Concision & Precision: Poetry is usually* more concise than prose. (*Of course there are prose poems...
