Curious & Inspired

Diamond L

It was short-lived, an ill-fated love affair. After leaving Michael for good, I placed an ad on the ride board in the Student Union at Kalamazoo College to see if I could find myself a companion for the trip back to California and help with the gas. When I spoke to Clara, she seemed right. […]

Martins: A Special Place

Martin de Porres, House of Hospitality, a venerable soup kitchen, is all about love. Each person who comes to Martin’s is treated like a guest, made to feel at home, safe and as a consequence loved. It is a special place where the interaction between the volunteers and guests, many who have been helping out […]

Dia de los Muertos

Lupe kneels on the cool red-tiled patio floor loosening orange petals, divining a journey of flowers out her door, out of her courtyard, out the front gate. Debemos de guiara los espíritus. The air warm, pungent. Smoke lingering from last night’s mesquite fire. Lupe, her husband, and their two young girls erect an altar: marigolds, […]

Wine Notes

At Trefethen we tasted wine at a long live edged table light balancing off wine barrels that surrounded us. The notes in front of us spoke of “bright, pineapple, peach, lingering aromas of cut apple, gardenia, tarragon, spicy on the palette” another wine, “an elegant nose of violets, plums, cherries, hints of forest floor […]

Pizza

It was his first day in his new role. A role he had not expected. All three knew the family had shrunk by one. It was going to be him, solo dad, and his two small children. Dinner tonight would be pizza. He would order a big one: a simple margherita: mozzarella and tomato sauce, […]

Tiny Beauty

The stone brown owl from Japan, painted tile from Deruta, a Ginko leaf picked up on a pathway in Japan. Tiny memories pressed into books, set on a table, placed on a window sill. A child’s dimpled finger, tiny birds with yellow wings dipping their beaks in cool water. Lazy lizards scurrying under rocks, crawling […]

When I Think About Immigration

When I think about immigration, I think about Manuel. I find myself back in college many years ago living in a place where many Latinos cooked our food in the dining commons. Manuel, a big burly guy with a wide smile, was one of those people whom I had gotten to know. We became […]

Missing

I saw a small wooden cross tied to a tree when coming up 101 towards Petaluma. The traffic was bumper to bumper. I was in the passenger seat and happened to glance towards the trees. I saw it there, lonely, askew, some flowers wilted, tied there. Evidence of a loss from another time, a […]

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