Last night I dreamed I had a smart phone and I was eating it. Weird, I know. I’ll chalk it up to being in the process of writing this blog post. Because I had a moment this past week that shocked me, even though it was only a visceral confirmation of things I already knew.…
Read MoreAll articles filed in quiet
Bigger Than Me
Sometimes, I just need to get away. No matter how much work is hanging over my head, I know I need to make the time to hike, or bike, or kayak—and always, to find a quiet, beautiful spot to sit and be still. It’s necessary for my mental health. Sometimes I get a twinge of…
Read MoreMy “Week Off”
I was supposed to take this week, the last week of summer school, as a week off writing. I’ve finished my novel revision, and that was my reward: scrapbooking, some time sitting outside in the quiet, a shopping trip, maybe even a couple hours in front of the TV. Well, I have deadlines, so forget…
Read MoreI’ve Forgotten How To Be Still
When I was in the sixth grade, I wore soft contacts that I had to stick in this boiler thingamabob every night. And every night I would open the lid and unscrew the contact case to make sure my contacts were still in there. Not just once. Again and again, until the case got to…
Read MoreThe Courage To Be Still
There are 553 books on my Goodreads “to read” list. I have at least three more flute pieces to write, and I have four novel ideas, one awaiting another major revision, and one that is 3/4 drafted. Every Tuesday and Thursday, we have two kids out of the house at 6:45 a.m. to get…
Read MoreAt The Edge Of The Field
It’s Friday afternoon and out in the country, the air smells sweet and cool. The sun has been disappearing, hour by hour, into haze and then cloud and, at length, a fully overcast sky. It’s Field Trip day. I’m parked along a gravel road with the windows open and a baby asleep on my shoulder…
Read MoreSacred Spaces
I have my places–places I go to be quiet and still. Although they are public spaces, one and all, I consider them mine, and I make a concerted effort to preserve them that way by visiting them when everyone else is busy with other things. A bluff overlooking a valley of sycamore and cedar, maple…
Read MoreEarly Morning: Taking stock on the cusp of a new year
It’s quiet outside this morning, and the slim sliver of cream-colored moon, its remainder a charcoal disc, lounges in a straight line with two bright stars in the eastern sky. Last night was yet another bad night in a month-long string of bad nights (where, oh where did my lovely easygoing baby go? Is this…
Read MoreParched
God’s been calling me lately. As the blasted earth bakes and leaves wither on their branches; as they drop ungracefully to the ground, bleached and crunchy three months before the proper time; as big, billowy clouds form and dissipate listlessly amid gray-brown-blue skies impenetrable with humidity; as priceless, fleeting storms direct their energy southward (mostly)…
Read MoreWhen What You Need, You Can’t Have
This weekend, I read the most beautiful description of a place, a description that picked up my heart and plopped it down in the Sierra Nevada, and my whole body ached to hop a plane and follow it there. There hasn’t been much time for solitude and communing with God through creation in the last…I…
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Kathleen M. Basi 