Sensory Gratification Is Free (and Freeing)
Gloppy paint, a velvet couch, the ridges meant to cool a coffee cup to the touch, a lid that when spun emits a hollow sound of increasingly lower pitches as it empties, like a bottle whistle….
Gloppy paint, a velvet couch, the ridges meant to cool a coffee cup to the touch, a lid that when spun emits a hollow sound of increasingly lower pitches as it empties, like a bottle whistle….
The old apothecaries were far more efficient, and far kinder, than our streamlined mail order and national chains.
Why has clothing gotten less practical, less sustainable, and less comfortable?
My poor friend. She sent me this nice article from the BBC about how travelers to the World Cup “are discovering little-known slices of Americana away from the host cities.” The word “triggered” would be apt. I had already seen the social media reels and posts—and in my…
I took a Flix bus to Chicago, determined to be there for the Juneteenth opening of the Obama Presidential Center.
“You took a what?” friends said, bemused that I did not fly, drive, or even take the train. But I love buses. I love the way everybody shows…
One foot on a tangle of tree root, I looked down at my beloved Merrell hiking boots and noticed big, frayed holes on both sides. Time to spring for a new pair. To be loyal, I went—in the flesh—to REI, but they had only waterproof hiking boots. “Tariffs,” muttered…
“Those poor brutish Epicureans that have nothing but the meer husks of fleshly pleasure to feed themselves with.” ~John Smith, 1660
How did we get Epicurus so wrong? Foodie websites, luxury magazines, gourmet shops…he would be aghast. His goal was to remove pain and fear, not pile up…
We have given ourselves two more years, ample time to continue spreading out in this friendly, comfy, century-old house. Two more years, my mother’s daughter whispers, to keep weeding, scrubbing, repainting the wrought-iron fence…. By the time we leave, we will be thoroughly ready for a smaller, more practical,…
Anger has never been my go-to. Now and then I fume, even simmer a while. But I recoil from rage; for me, it is far easier to find excuses or let slide.
Until now.
The Trump Administration has undone six decades of complacent serenity. No doubt its…
Every week, I page through: nope, nope, nope. All I want is one New Yorker cartoon as funny as they used to be, so I can stick it on the fridge and grin at it when I start dinner. Is it me, have I misplaced my sense of humor…