Author Archives: Trish

I’m always on the lookout for a great character description. Usually, it’s a fictional description, but, while reading a profile by Taffy Brodesser-Akner of Val Kilmer in the New York Times Magazine, I came across this: “He’s 61 now. He’s still so handsome. His hair is still blond. His eyes are still the unimaginable greenContinue reading “A good character description is worth a thousand pictures!”

The English translation of The Time in Between by Maria Duenas came out in 2011. But I only came across it recently when I had the chance to quickly browse the local bookstore (by appointment), looking for some pandemic reading. The Spanish Civil War isn’t a pandemic but it certainly left the citizens of SpainContinue reading “Another Time in Between”

A few weeks after my mother died in 2011, I went to my massage therapist for a much needed massage. While she would work, instrumental music would always play softly in the background. That day the music made me unutterably sad. I’m not sure if it was because my mother was a pianist or ifContinue reading “Ghosts in the Music”

“The more you know of any aspect, the better you can handle it. This goes for yourself too. When you know everything that is to know, it is called Realization.” — Sadhguru What I know about myself is that I am a horrible person. I discover this on November 19, 2018, the day I goContinue reading “Me: A Horrible Person”

One year ago today I took my ex-husband out of a skilled nursing facility and back to his house. I’d spent the the previous week scouring the kitchen and bathrooms, sweeping floors, vacuuming rugs and trying my damndest to make the place habitable. I bought an adjustable bed for downstairs and had his TV setContinue reading “One Year Ago Today”

Once, quite early in our relationship, we came across a story about a couple who committed suicide in an unusual manner. They took the back window out of a pick up truck, looped a rope around a tree and then fastened either end to each of their necks. One of them sat in the driver’sContinue reading “Two Necks, One Rope”

Hurricane Florence made landfall on Sept. 14, 2018. It was a big, scary storm and about 40 people in North Carolina died as a result. I don’t know how they died. Did they drown? Were they crushed by falling trees? In Charlotte, we were far enough inland that the dangers didn’t register with us. InContinue reading “Premonition”