Blog

Denying when we need help is not helping I wear hearing aids. Am I disabled? I was disabled when I had foot surgery and my foot was in a cast for 8 weeks. I used a knee scooter and had … Read More

The intersection of time and space in the Playa Photo by Jake Weirick on Unsplash I drove to eastern Oregon through hours of sage bush, despairing at my decision to attend a writer’s workshop in this godforsaken place. Rifts of … Read More

Freighted Meaning and Hunting Targets A pair of mourning doves eat the seeds underneath my feeder. Although I rotate the bird feeder on a pole, the squirrels’ acrobatics get the seeds to fall. It serves them, but also the birds who … Read More

Persistence and incrementalism get us further in life and work “I believe counts, right now, for more than “the evidence shows…” Belief based on emotion is dangerous. We need to be humble. The world can make us so. Passion is … Read More

The scent and taste wafting in the air. My favorite lavender festival was last weekend, and a friend and I made our annual trek to the fields and hills of the Willamette Valley in Oregon. Pictures of the mounded purple … Read More

Impeach Chief Justice Earl Warren Earl Warren is now regarded as one of the great Supreme Court leaders of the twentieth century. He was not a shrewd constitutional lawyer, but he was a politician who could straddle both sides of … Read More

The questions and answers we all seek, vol. 2 Dear Ms. Merriwether, I am stymied by boxes of archived writing and other ephemera I have acquired. Ever since I retired, which is, alas, five years ago, I vowed to sort … Read More

Answers to questions on life and writing Dear Gentle Reader, Ms. Merriwether (c’est Moi) is opening an advice column for all your questions about life and writing, or the writing life. I will select several questions from the comments section … Read More

Raspberries Ripen in July, Love Follows I was in my son’s garden this afternoon, picking raspberries. I picked berries when I was little in my father’s garden at the end of our yard, and that’s how friends have remembered me … Read More

Equity in education and sports has had a huge impact No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education … Read More