So I can stop Googling “What does fun feel like?” — Three months ago, I started a “joy list.” A simple concept, really: a written list of all the things that I find joyful each day. It’s way harder than I expected. Most days, I don’t have much new to add to the list at all. It’s either a repeat of…

A free writing piece on self-image. — I look at myself in the mirror. My front tooth is wobbling — look at it go! I push my hair aside as I lean closer, as close as I can get to myself. I can’t stop looking. “Mom, I think it’s ready to come out!” I shout, my hands…

And yes, it helped. A lot. — I woke up on the wrong side of the bed. I can barely call it waking up on the wrong side of the bed, because I hadn’t slept a wink the night before. …

A tale about my childhood home. — I grew up in a castle. It was gated around the front — posts and beams so tall I had to stand up on my tiptoes to peer over the edges and see the outside world. The right side was guarded by a stone wall. We would always climb on…

A reflection on the heaviness I feel today. — I want to move to California. I want to wake up to the sun shining across palm trees. I want to see the beaches and the mountains and the desert and more beaches, please, always more beaches. I want to meet people from different backgrounds, from different places, with ancestors that didn’t…

A free writing piece on childhood. — My childhood memory is empty. When I hear other people’s stories — the experiences they had as a child, the events they attended, the insights they had, both good and bad, while they watched their father fish on summer evenings — I always close my eyes and try to think…

On how this dreaded goal is actually improving my mood. — I HATE running. I love to exercise and be active. But running? The absolute bane of my existence. I can barely run one 10-minute mile without cursing out the entire world twice over. My body, it seems, just isn’t built for it. Or, maybe my mind isn’t. …

And on Monday, I start working in an office again. — A year ago today I quit my office job to become a barista. This article is not going to be another one of those increasingly popular how to move from a six-figure corporate salary to living off of coffee shop tips and freelance work! pieces. 1, because I never had…

A free writing poem. — Thisness. Not who, what, where, when, why, or howness. Not me, you, I, us, them, we, otherness. Not yesterday, today, tomorrow, future, past, hours, minutes, secondsness. Just thisness. The thisness…