Category Archives: Uncategorized

The Loneliness of Nonconformity

Edward Scissorhands (1990) is perhaps the quintessential fairy tale of the artist. In Edward’s quest for belonging, we can all find something of ourselves. Isolated and undeniably different, he is willing to give up his scissor-hands to be more like everyone else. He smiles with sweet, earnest boyishness at those who ask if he’d likeContinue reading “The Loneliness of Nonconformity”

Ex-Mormon Girl Buys Tobacco

For the first time. Ever. So, I was completing a kayak run when I saw a waterfront shop awning: Union Cigar Society. In the window, a banner in Italic script read “Fine Cigars and Accessories.” Now, I’ve only just been introduced to cigars in 2012. I had never smoked anything until this spring. And then,Continue reading “Ex-Mormon Girl Buys Tobacco”

On Love, Autonomy, and the Limitations of Feminism

Recently, I’ve been reading Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch (1970). And she strikes a nerve with me when she writes, “Our society encourages the substitution of addiction for spontaneous pleasure and specifically encourages women to foster dependencies which will limit their mates’ tendencies to roving and other forms of instability” (176). Men in turn, she argues, areContinue reading “On Love, Autonomy, and the Limitations of Feminism”

The Fulfillment of Longing

In the opening scene of Shadowlands, C.S. Lewis lifts a paperweight from his desk–a rose in full bloom, encased in glass–and tells his Oxford students that this rose is perfect because it will not age, will not decay, and can never be touched. “The most intense joy,” he argues, “lies not in the having…but in theContinue reading “The Fulfillment of Longing”

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

Growing up Mormon, I was taught early on to choose my friends and acquaintances carefully. Notice the effect they have on you, I was told. Notice how they treat other people. Consider how you feel around them. Scripture verses were passed out along with crayons and animal crackers, and one of the first things I learnedContinue reading “Good Fences Make Good Neighbors”

Making Peace with Imperfection

“That time of year thou mayst in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruin’d choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.” Thus begins Shakespeare’s Sonnet 73, and I think of it every autumn–but most of all in the weeks that moveContinue reading “Making Peace with Imperfection”

The Depths Beneath

On the last warm day of 2012, I rented a kayak and paddled out into Lake Union in Seattle. Just as I adjusted the rudder, guiding the bow east and across the lake, I was seized with panic. I thought of the depths below me. Fifty feet under my hull, there was only darkness. NotContinue reading “The Depths Beneath”