joy & moxie

a creative life

Frost

Frost is nature’s graffiti. Jack Frost came in the night and painted on the window panes with his index finger. I imagine him as Peter Pan’s doppelganger cousin. An ageless mischievous boy who makes his art and flicks away into the night, thrives on the bitter cold and eats snow. He might also be responsible for […]

Journal Making

It was a tough Fall and Christmas. This is measured in the absence of any journal entries after October 29th, a few days before Ninja went in for the appointment that would determine, once and for all, that she had polycystic kidneys. With Thanksgiving and Christmas looming, as well as writing my novel and the […]

Sparrow Love

I might be in the minority when it comes to sparrows. I feel sorry for them. Growing up surrounded by bird lovers, I heard many a lament about the number of sparrows dining on suet and birdseed that was intended for the chickadees, cardinals and finches. Only the squirrels were hated more for this infraction. […]

January Live-Joys

  January. I always thought the name had a cold, funereal sound. It implies a silence broken only by gusts of frigid, snow-laden winds crashing against windowpanes.

Clean Pages

Every December 31st and January 1st I find myself floating on a sort of New Year’s euphoria. Suddenly, time becomes a clean, white, empty slate upon which we can write, a blanket of newly-fallen snow. The possibilities are endless, and the first footsteps to mark that landscape are special. I’m always in a hurry to begin.