Focus in the Fog

Smile! It sounds simple, but when I think about my day and my to do list, smiling is the last thing on my mind. My face acts as a signal for my kids; it tells them how to proceed. And don’t smiles change the way we feel? They give us hope and make those around us smile too. A few weeks ago, I tried something at home. Smiling. I don’t mean that I never smile, but I consciously tried to smile instead of any other face I might absentmindedly make. My kids often say that when I’m

I’ve seen a story from the book “Art and Fear”, that’s making its away around social media. A ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups. All those on the left side of the studio, he said, would be graded solely on the quantity of work they produced, all those on the right solely on its quality. His procedure was simple: on the final day of class he would bring in his bathroom scales and weigh the work of the “quantity” group: 50

As Mother’s Day approaches, I think about my experience as a mother. How it’s changed me, grown me, and made me more tired than I ever thought possible. Recently, a number of my former students have become first-time parents. Social media is great for keeping up with this kind of exciting news and I love seeing their ecstatic faces as they hold their adorable little bundles. I can’t help but reminisce on my own experiences having babies. Those beautiful, exhausting, memorable