Twisting the arrow

The movement of the second hand on the clock heightens my sense that time is a scarce resource. I often feel like I am running out of time, like I am competing against the clock. One of my highest enacted values is accomplishing a task in the shortest amount of time, or accomplishing more things…

Connection > End

I have struggled with a fear of death since I was a child. When I was about 13 years old, I went through a period where death was my first thought when I woke up each morning. I know that fearing death is natural and as close to a universal human experience as exists, but…

A fictitious letter about AP African American Studies

Members of the College Board:  We received your recent application to import your Advanced Placement African American Studies class into the great state of Florida. We appreciate your desire to spread your woke ideologies throughout the country, and especially to bring them to God-fearing Floridians.  However, those Floridians of the white race are constitutionally unable…

What will change?

An early January day in Chicago, filled with warm sunshine. A day in February, with flower shoots poking through the soil. Mid-March and the tree buds are breaking open. The markers of a typical year, transposed in time, signs of a disrupted rhythm. Weather is not climate and history is not destiny, but this sits…

Connectedness

I usually resist the push for New Year’s resolutions because it feels to me like a contrived focus on personal change. Why does January 1st need to be the point when we change our behavior? Why would we be more successful at this time of year than at any other? So I usually don’t make…

Celebrate the darkness

It is a habit for many of us – tying the ideas of light and life and those of darkness and death. It seems logical – sunlight provides the heat for the ground to thaw, the energy for plants to grow, and therefore the power for our biological systems. Light means summer and increase and…

Jolly

This is one of my first attempts at fiction. Please let me know what you think – positive or critical – by commenting below. Sebastian jolted awake from a nightmare, all blood and teeth, hideous laughter and terrified running. "Mommy! Daddy!" he called, but there was no answer. He yelled to them again, but heard…

Rest vs. production

I looked at the clock. It was 2:25am and I hadn’t slept one minute. I had been laying there for four hours, waiting patiently, hoping to drift off to sleep. But the moment I saw the time, I felt my last ounce of patience curdle into dread. I wasn't going to sleep. The next day…

How we see the snow

The snow arrives early this year, before we are ready. The leaves are still on the trees. They had some time to fall yet, we say. We are not prepared. But if we are honest with ourselves, when have we embraced change? It always comes against our will and wishes, Pushing in where it is…