Two poems make me ponder gratitude and acknowledgment. Original essay link here: https://medium.com/the-masterpiece/these-winter-days-as-a-snow-man-98407a333c41?sk=1334bf8e0260e6da4bee154ee86cc4a8. Photo by Lanis Rossi (Lancaster County, PA). Photo used with permission. 

I was transformed from what I witnessed from my window. Original story published on The Environment: https://medium.com/the-environment/adjusting-our-inward-and-outward-senses-to-the-rhythms-of-nature-bdb393960a75?sk=4bdae89f3f3f243202ca11172ca5529c

We must do more than pray our way around the inconvenience. Original story was published here on The Masterpiece: https://medium.com/the-masterpiece/thou-shall-not-interrupt-mass-with-the-messy-randomness-of-death-c0e0a0436d6e?sk=32eebce00d448d759ada2f573236dbb2. The image comes from St. Andrew’s Catholic Church, located in Roanoke, Virginia, USA. Link.

What were we doing ‘hangin’ round’ in Colorado, anyway? That became the catchphrase for the entire trip. Whenever we got into trouble or tent blew off a mountain, and I had to trek across the tundra to Walmart for a broom to use as a tent pole or those damned Mormons — no marmots were attacking us for our Snickers bars, and one of us would say, “You know, what are we doing hangin’ ‘round?” The original printed essay is here, published in The Riff: https://medium.com/the-riff/michael-nesmith-saved-us-on-phantom-canyon-road-b5521bbb52f4?sk=f89829fa4e958d30b0697d5ea203bc67

Chapter 31 illustrates the upside-down world of morality in the Antebellum South and the center of Huck’s moral crossroads

Walter Bowne and his daughter Nancy Bowne discuss what makes a great cover song, and review a few from their growing list of "deep cuts." Hope you enjoy! 

Family photo albums are cunning deceivers. That wasn’t what I expected from a visit to my mother’s, but that’s what lingered. Of course, I didn’t share this revelation with my mother because no single criticism sticks to her children — even when we’re slathered in Gorilla glue. Why should the family album not place the same emphasis on conflict and crisis as the great novels and the famous scores that reveal the indomitable human spirit and struggle?

A Dug-Out of One's Own: High-cost creative writing programs are having difficulty competing with zero-cost jails. The original essay was published here on MuddyUm: https://medium.com/muddyum/an-ivy-league-lit-scout-offers-a-confession-dd6cccd6d6c9?sk=17875f0e91ed98350817f997c2c9454f

Chapter 3: The Feast of an Innocent: Thaddeus should have retreated, but irrational hope was always one of his cardinal vices.