Uphill idealist

This piece written by Mark Twain, was the focus of today's vignette for The Writer's Almanac for November 30th, 2009. I love the artful blend of this excerpt that follows because it captures the sleepy restfulness of the small town, and the jarring excitement of what new thing is soon coming down the river. On this second day of Advent, it is a time of expectation and waiting. If we allow it, Advent can also be a time of rest in preparation for the joy and light of Christmas to arrive. So on this Monday of expectation and waiting, what moments of the last week made you feel most alive? What ones made you feel most drained of life? Do you sense something new and exciting stirring in your heart? Is there something that needs to be released to the churning river waters so that the next step in the journey can be freely made? As you read this short piece by Mark Twain, let the mighty Mississippi roll around in your heart. We never know for sure what a wade in the water can stir ...

Image from CSS play. Here is Writer's Almanac segment for today: June 3rd, 2009. Click here to listen to the podcast for today. The Ordinary by Kirsten Dierking It's summer, so the pink gingham shorts, the red mower, the neat rows of clean smelling grass unspooling behind the sweeping blades. A dragonfly, black body big as a finger, will not leave the mower alone, loving the sparkle of scarlet metal, seeing in even a rusting paint the shade of a flower. But I wave him off, conscious he is wasting his time, conscious I am filling my time with such small details, distracting colors, like pink checks, like this, then that, like a dragonfly wing in the sun reflecting the color of opals, like all the hours we leave behind, so ordinary, but not unloved. "The Ordinary" by Kirsten Dierking, from Northern Oracle. © Spout Press, 2007. Reprinted with permission. (buy now)

The Writer's Almanac is a daily email feed that comes to my email inbox. It's a lovely way to learn about authors of days past, new writers of today and even read or listen to Garrison read (as only Garrison can)a poem to you every day. Listening to Garrison read the poem Durham Wheat reminds me of sitting in my favorite college English class, and having the privilege of my professor sharing writings that touched her heart and expanded my literary vision. Take a moment, and click on the link to hear Garrison read to you too. Let the words wash over you and give you a vision for where and who you are today. Durum wheat by Lisa Martin-Demoor Memory at its finest lacks corroboration —no photographs, no diaries— nothing to pin the past on the present with, to make it stick. Just because you've got this idea of red fields stretching along the tertiary roads of Saskatchewan, like blazing, contained fires — just because somewhere in your memory there's a rust-coloured pulse ...

Ian and I the summer of 1992 - a few months after our wedding. It turns out I had just found out I was just expecting my daughter in this photo. In the wake of Myspace, Facebook re-connections and looking through old photos last weekend, I stumbled across this poem by Tony Hogland at the Writers Almanac online . His poem reminds me of my youth, I was full of energy, passion, and possibility and I like how his own reflection captures a touch of what I felt at age seventeen. Minus the drunk part of course (Mom), and the fact that we've never driven away from our love for each other (Ian) . I only live twenty or so miles from where I grew up. I lived in the woods, we got our groceries in a literal one-stop-light town, and I still managed to find love. Imagine that. How lovely, even through all its transitions, that the love I met at seventeen is still with me and loves me in return. That is something I'll never take for granted. Thank you Ian for loving me. Here's to the pas...