Monthly Archives: June 2025

Now Playing: Don’t Stop Me Now, Queen Go get ‘em, Freddie! Put that on repeat and your day will be made. Y’all, I’ve felt rough the past few days, but today? Better.Maybe it’s the caffeine, the breeze on the café porch, or the mercy of the rain finally moving on. (I love rain, just notContinue reading “Word Raccoon Unlocks New Superpower”

Mimosa trees don’t often get star billing in literature, though they do appear if you look closely. There’s one leaning over the Finch house in To Kill a Mockingbird, part of the Southern landscape where childhood collides with adult injustice. I admire the book, but I don’t want to re-read it any time soon. TheContinue reading “Mimosas Loitering in Literature”

Or, Down With Exceptionalism Now playing: “Just the Way You Are,” Billy Joel I came across this yesterday:“Your purpose is not the thing you do. It is the thing that happens in others when you do what you do.” — Dr. Caroline Leaf (This post is for me and all of those I may haveContinue reading “WR Wants You to Smell the Limburger”

Now Playing: “All I Wanna Do” — Sheryl Crow I’m on the sunporch, and Word Raccoon is on my shoulder, listening to Tuesday Night Music Club, and I’ve promised to share a poem with her that I had to learn by heart in junior high. I don’t remember it all now, but it’s Longfellow. AndContinue reading “Happy Hour: A Pause in the Day’s Occupations”

Now Playing: “Because the Night” – Patti Smith This morning, I was thinking about my grown children, before they were grown. Something about the chill in the house reminded me of weekends at the cabin we used to rent on the lake. I grabbed my favorite mug and filled it with tea and came outdoors.Continue reading “Unstuck in Time”

Now playing: All the Brian Wilson, and you should play it, too. Brian Wilson has left us. I had a moment when I heard, some tears. You know how it is when you’re in public, and you don’t want to display emotion, but some displays do not ask permission, and there we were. (If I’mContinue reading “I Guess I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times”

Now Playing: Beast of Burden, The Stones. Of course. A post about Brian Wilson is nearly ready. Pages long. I cried yesterday. And today. I listened to the songs. But I’m not ready. Not yet. In the meantime, I left Word Raccoon unsupervised, and she found such naughty things to do. I kept trying toContinue reading “Sacred Mutual Art Portal, DO NOT IGNORE™”

Word Raccoon woke me up about 1:30 this morning. “Where. Are. My. Earrings??” She shouted. She kept me up until after three with her nonsense. Not only did she accuse me of earring theft, which, I was the one who ordered them, sweet writing wreck, but I was pretty disappointed myself not to know whereContinue reading “I Get the Snickers! Multiple Happy Endings”

(Also missing, inexplicably? Some of the letters for the above poster. But whatever.) Now Playing: Hide and Seek. (See title.) Okay, I’ve done it now. Word Raccoon is not speaking to me because I HAVE MISPLACED HER PINK POM POM EARRINGS. We went to find them this morning. They are nowhere to be found. What’sContinue reading “Word Raccoon and the Case of the Missing Earrings (and Missing Poems)”

Now Playing: Layla, Clapton’s acoustic version “He gave a melancholy sigh and stood looking at her a moment, with his hands behind him, giving short nervous shakes to his hunting-crop. ‘Do you know I’m very much afraid of it – of that remarkable mind of yours?’”— Henry James, The Portrait of a Lady Likewise, Mr.Continue reading ““She feels in italics and thinks in CAPITALS.” – H.J.”