“Stop calling 2020 a marathon” (Runner’s World, Oct. 31, 2020)

This year has indeed felt like the longest of slogs, an endurance test notable mostly for its many varieties of exhaustion and pain. Pandemic and quarantines. Poisonous politics. Violence and rage. And on the West Coast, where I live in Oregon, real fires that fueled the societal ones. But that’s where the parallels end. Continue reading.

“For families missing their kids' teachers, lockdown is a perfect time for a parade” (USA Today, May 7, 2020)

Four weeks into Oregon’s stay-at-home order, as a contagious and yet-incurable virus stalked the globe, I did what any still-sane person should do. I took my youngest daughter to a parade. Continue reading.

“Watch your feed” (Oregon Humanities, Fall/Winter 2020)

I am alerted to their arrival not by an iPhone chime but by the wild vibration of beating wings. Both feeds, the phone kind and the hummingbird kind, are buzzy and addictive. But with the bird kind, the news is always the same: time to eat. Continue reading.

“High pony: The power of a hairstyle you can no longer pull off” (Curated by Medium for Parenting and Beauty)

The bodies of the college girls staggered me. Long sculpted legs, passing on my left. Smooth honey-colored skin, not a ding or divot visible anywhere, not on their arms or faces or thighs. Continue reading.