Every public middle and high school in my hometown sent two students per grade to an annual writing competition. It was a contest of speed: describe an object in 40 words before 10 minutes are up, argue a point of view for 120 words in 30 minutes, and so on. I went every year, and… Continue reading Hurry up please it’s time
Category: Personal Narrative
Scenes from the last few weeks of my former life
One In those days, my best friend R from college would stay with me for one weekend a month. Often we just drank wine and ate fancy cheeses, the height of adult sophistication as we imagined it in our twenties. When I saw him in the last few weeks of my former life, I had… Continue reading Scenes from the last few weeks of my former life
Notes on Piranesi
In which I either lose or find myself in a book Entry on the day of our fourth virtual watch party for the His Dark Materials television series, season 2 I read Susanna Clark's Piranesi in two days. It might have been one, but I keep busy. It was the beginning of the week, and… Continue reading Notes on Piranesi
An intention for 2021
It seems like tempting fate to make any resolutions for the new year. Didn't 2020 just show us not to hold our plans too dear? But an intention is more like a guideline--something to fall back on when everything else is falling apart. In that sense, a pandemic is the best time to set an… Continue reading An intention for 2021
Tattoos for English Majors
Up until relatively recently, this blog had a title, and the title was Scribal Tattoo. I wasn't particularly attached to the name, which is a shallow pun on "tribal tattoo": I'm the scribe, obviously, and while I'm not more tattooed than your average writer, my identity as a tattooed person goes all the way back… Continue reading Tattoos for English Majors
In which I try to process my feelings through books
Little Women One Monday morning in January, I was home from work for the bank holiday. I had been dragging my feet on starting the first assignments for my online course in climate science. Reluctantly, I started playing the lectures as I boiled beans for chili, darting to my computer to pause the video and… Continue reading In which I try to process my feelings through books