Hello World . Those words popped into my head yesterday as I was looking out my office window. I heard the lyrics of an old Country-Western song, which I thought was “Hello World,” and could hear the crooning and

I call them “bridges.” These jobs I take to get me to my next adventure—or to the other side, so to speak. All the while, I continue to write, to gather thoughts and words, to put them down and plan

He plays with them—relentlessly, slipping and sliding on the hardwood, running in a circle until he’s dizzy, then flopping over on his side to chomp down on his prey. The selection of peacock feathers has dwindled to only a couple

I think these grasses cause such emotion in me because they remind me of the time I spent in North Carolina where they grew along the beach and the huge sand dunes at Nags Head; so different from the California

Forty-six (yes, 46) years ago, my brother, Anthony John Pepper went missing in Vietnam. Alongside him, another young man, 19 years of age, James Trimble. Neither of them were ever found. Nothing came home, not a scrap of clothing, not

Powder and a powder puff—that’s what I wanted. To open a box of lightly-scented dusting powder and puff on the soft light scent of days gone by. I could smell the powder on my mother’s vanity; was it White Shoulders?

A few years ago, I decided I wanted a fern garden. Even with the heat, I figured I could keep them shaded, watered, misted, and they’d flourish. The ferns knew better. They held their own, but on a day when

People look down on them. “They carry disease,” they say. They have that long tail; they scuttle along tops of fences and    . . . but when my little Rocky cat gets one—a baby one—that sits frozen in fear

Are you living a life that is genuinely comfortabl e or one that is deceptively comfortable? In his book, The Slight Edge, Jeff Olson asks this question. I’ve heard things about getting out of your comfort zone , but this

We sat in the warmth of our hot tub feeling the weather change; a soft mist had begun to fall; the air was warm. A front was moving in—or out. Low grey clouds hid them as they flew over. Sandhill