Nearly Autumn News

[et_pb_section admin_label=”section”] [et_pb_row admin_label=”row”] [et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text”]Well, it’s nearly fall. Up here, outside of Winnipeg, the leaves are already transitioning to their autumn tones of amber and red, and the showy mountain ash tree we planted in the spring is full of birds building up their stores for the long flight south. In our house, […]

Ordinary Life

Coffee in a blue and orange pottery mug. The indigo sky pushing at the cold window glass. J. emptying the dishwasher. The dog dozing at the top of the stairs, waiting for his first walk. A dream drifting on the morning peripheral: a goat pestering me, persistently biting and tugging the sand-coloured wool sweater I’m […]

On Showing Up

The other day, I was talking with a friend about showing up. Just past blue Monday, in a frigid winter that’s kept us inside for days, some mornings the best that you can do is stumble over to your desk, sit there, and wait. Not for the green thrust of spring. Not even for epiphanies. […]

Finishing

There’s a moment that often comes back to me. Early autumn of 2010, at a bed-and-breakfast in Ontario’s Muskokas. I was there on a solitary writing retreat and in the afternoon, at the desk, after a few days of hard work, I typed the last words and finished Swarm. I stood up, walked outside, and […]

Night Blooming

Last night, I learned a lesson. Again. Early yesterday morning, I’d sat in the chair in my office, coffee on a nearby coaster, staring at the blank page of my notebook. I was stuck. In particular, on a chapter that seemed contrived, where something happens but I didn’t like how it happened. It was too […]