The older I get the more important it is for me to go home. Home to Texas home where my youth played out. Where my girl hood launched....

Once up a time, I wrote a book. The inspiration for my first book was a poem—“Invitation to a Voyage”—by Charles Baudelaire, one of the...

Harvest time. Not fruits of my bygone Camelot, Lush wine grapes Juicy oranges. Instead, the modest kumquat Is sought From my hillside...

Vincent Van Gogh, who experienced many tumultuous seasons as he created his radically idiosyncratic, emotionally evocative art,...

Six months between cataract surgeries (don’t ask) and I wear a contact on one eye during the day and read at night without the contact...

Never paid much attention to Galentine’s Day, although I adored Amy Poehler’s Leslie Knope character on Parks and Recreation. Galentine’s...

After multiple crunch time plane excursions, the idea of getting in an automobile and traveling north from San Diego had great appeal....

Join me for this virtual reading hosted by Wild Roof Journal. I'll be reading along with other contributors to Issue 18. The reading will...

Indulging in one final guilty pleasure before beginning the trials of New-Year’s-Resolutions-eating, I opened the small brown bag...

The invitation for the dreaded gift exchange stated unisex and at the bottom in barely perceptible font size, up to $100 limit. Yes, I am...

The season so far has been bittersweet. Joy and sorrow hand in hand as Christmas approaches. A good friend loses her husband. Another...

When the front door of my daughter’s home in Valley Center opened, I froze. The sight of her face—a blackish-purple swollen...

Somehow with the time change, it seems the shadows are longer. “Most of the shadows of this life are caused by standing in one’s own...

But here comes my Manzanita Christmas tree from the ranch thanks to my next-door son!

This Texas girl turned Southern Californian experienced an Autumn to remember days ago on the Appalachian Trail in North Carolina. My...

From the top shelf in the auto department of Ace Hardware, I pulled a shiny aluminum funnel, the kind for they use at Serrato’s Auto in...

Connie and I sat next to each other, both with coffee in hand, just before the workshop on writing articles for magazines started at ten...

Bookended by Labor Day and the holiday season, Autumn is here. The Turning of the season, although we scarcely notice in Southern...

I have been called a persnickety eater. Certainly, I'm an unadventurous diner. Not likely to dive into unfamiliar dishes. Especially...

Three minutes, at most. I pulled into the designated dry cleaners parking spot fifteen feet away from the establishment in the Trader...