The Long Road of Blog
“It’s as though I were living at last in my eyes, as I have always dreamed of doing, and I think then I know why I’ve come here: to see, and so to go out against new things—oh god how easily—like air in a breeze. It’s true there are moments—foolish moments, ecstasy on a tree stump—when I’m all but gone, scattered I like to think like seed…”
William Gass, In the Heart of the Heart of the Country
To HBL on His Birthday
Thank you for making my world a better place. May this year be full of miracles and wonder.
The Three Things That Changed My Thinking from Traumatized to Curious
Would you rather start your day an open door of anticipation or a freak show of anxiety? Your call. You decide.
Playing Your Life
Last night I was talking to Amy Geller. She is writing a book about about being both an adopted person and a therapist and what she has learned along the way that has allowed her to, finally, really, really, wildly thrive.
A Letter to a Young Adoptee Who Wants to Die
Except the world forgets about the fragility of skin when it gives a baby from one mother to another, and so your skin gets damaged, and it tells your brain things are wrong, there is trouble, you are in crisis, and your brain tries to protect you, tries to take you off this new planet for which you have not been prepared.
Why Chocolate Chip Cookies and Shots of Tequila are not Self-Care for Adopted People
If life were a ship, I was standing at the back, focused on the churning waters of the past. Who gives a shit what you do if all that matters is what happened yesterday and making yourself feel better because yesterday was hard?
What Queer Eye Goes to Japan has to Teach Orphans, Foster Kids, and Adopted People
I love the Fab Five: Antoni, Jonathan, Karamo, Bobby, and Tan. I love the whole concept of the show Queer Eye: go into someone’s life who is struggling and, in a week, overhaul whatever is causing major problems: their house, their body, their relationships, and, always, their sense of self-worth.
The Choke of Secrets
Listening to your own voice is such a generous gift you can give to both yourself and the world.
When You Want to Quit Everything. How to Become an Arrow and Get What You Really Want.
If change were easy it would be called a candy bar. Change can be terrifying. Walk around your house with your eyes closed for fifteen minutes. Suddenly this safe space is so dangerous! Now walk around your life with no idea who you really are if you aren’t the spouse and job and friends that make you sick. You may feel like you are dying, and that’s because you are, or at least the bound, half-alive part of you is.
Rene Denfield and the Birth of Love
Because to truly love someone, I think, also involves the luxury of hate, of fury, of anger, of disappointment, of honesty.
Write or Die and Infinite Potential
I think writer’s block is an energetic thing that indicates a really good story is banging at the door.
Schrödinger’s Cat and Stealing Kids for Cash
If there is money, and there is, for people to adopt children torn without consent from their parents, there is money to fund search and reunion.