(and everything is still awful) (but it gets better) (maybe) on the same day I tearfully call the veterinarian to make plans for my porch cat’s evening euthanasia I pass the final exam for a university math class I’ve lived in fear of for twenty years on the same day they tore down the Lamplighter Inn where my little…

A very short story. Her therapist told her not to get hung up on perfection. The opposite of done is perfect, she’d said, and Monica wasn’t sure if that was the actual quote but it got the point across and kept her from feeling guilty popping the top on a…

I do not want to grind any more no hustle no blessing no slay I do not want to high knees or move mountains or leave a mark or make an impact I want to slow roll down a grassy slope eyes closed catch a butterfly hold my breathe in the presence of a…

I can promise you my bathroom has never been so clean as the time I listened to Andrea Gibson read the holy words to Thank Goodness while I scrubbed and while I screamed there are and will always be some things that are made clean and holy through inner contemplation outward resignation through quiet and other…

When we travel, alone without their father, I opt for a story and save money in the seedy motels with creaking doors opening to my parking spot. If there isn’t cracking wallpaper borders at the lobby, gold varnished plastic light fixtures in the rooms, or character or actual DNA of…

We are driving east across rural Montana when I get the news that James Patrick Fortin has died. A few hours earlier, as my old and trusty van rumbled down gravel roads in West Glacier, we’d turned on Bohemian Rhapsody and sung loudly, all the voices. I think James would…

I think about dying every day so when Eric the yoga instructor encourages us to inhale and then exhale and then close the back of our throat and let ourselves feel empty and let ourselves feel need I think *this* is how I want to go mid-breath needing laying on my back or stretching…

My sister’s house boasts a large picture window south facing just off her kitchen and below it or in the bush near it lives a bird who has knocked itself silly running into the glass Daily more than once a day my sister and her family will hear the bird shuffle her wings…