Red's Wrap
Happiness. It's relative.
Category: Writing
The Art of Turning Around
It was getting late. We’d already gone to one campground, after traveling maybe five miles down a dirt road, that displayed a Campground Full sign. It was very hot – 102 degrees but, as they say, out West, it’s a dry heat. Absent the… Continue Reading “The Art of Turning Around”
Unburying the Undead
I’m reading a story at our writing group’s ‘showcase’ on Sunday afternoon. I loved the story I’m going to read until today when I told a very accomplished writer friend about it. “Send it to me,” he said, so when I got home, I… Continue Reading “Unburying the Undead”
Swirl
There were 200 dogs in the dog yard. Each one was tethered to a raised wooden platform with a big plastic cylinder that worked as a doghouse. Each dog’s name was on a sign on his platform, some had sleds parked in front. The… Continue Reading “Swirl”
I Call Myself a Writer
What I enjoy most about writing is thinking I can’t and then doing it. I like a blank page. I like pulling an idea out of the cotton candy that is often my brain. And I like how writing that one true sentence gives… Continue Reading “I Call Myself a Writer”
One Beautiful Day
I took out the thin folded $20 that I keep in the little slide drawer on the back of my phone and handed it to the bartender who’d just done an especially generous pour of Chardonnay for me. He held the twenty in his… Continue Reading “One Beautiful Day”
The Tiny Shrinking Cozy World of Deafness
I love my dogs more now that I’m going deaf. They’re not interested in having conversations. They just like to hang out. Wordlessly. It is a relief, an unburdening that is hard to explain to a person with fully functional hearing. It is exhausting… Continue Reading “The Tiny Shrinking Cozy World of Deafness”
All the Stories Aren’t Real
In the stories I write, there is almost always peril, someone is in trouble, or there is grief and struggle of other sorts. There is a woman, plucky and usually older, full of alternating self-doubt and bravado. There are men in my stories, but… Continue Reading “All the Stories Aren’t Real”
An Eagle on the 4th of July
I sat at the end of a dock today, waiting for the bald eagle that we had been watching off and on for the past hour to emerge from his perch and take flight again. Earlier, he’d flown over the lake in front of… Continue Reading “An Eagle on the 4th of July”
Snow Door | wisconsinacademy.org
Listen to Jan read her essay “Billy” presented on WUWM’s Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “At the Breakfast Bar” on WUWM Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “The Parish Hall,” on WUWM Lake Effect
“Fury Cannot Touch Me,” Modern Love, NYT, 9/29/11
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