Julie’s Journal
Getting Literary
For as long as I can remember, I have been borderline obsessed with reading. From studying the cereal box as a child, to craning my neck so I could make out messages on billboards. Words are like a combination lock for me, when I hear it click open, I discover . . . What?
Missing Grendel
The 180-pound European Great Dane lumbered into the psychiatric hospital’s recreational area, which looked a lot like an enclosed parking garage. He glanced around briefly at the dozen or so male patients gathered for the therapy visit, then elegantly lowered his horse-sized body to the ground.
In Praise of Indies: They’re Keeping our Art Alive
It was one of those soggy Saturdays and, as I stepped out of my vehicle in the city parking garage, a huge drip from a crack in the ceiling hit my forehead. I thought this day would have been better suited for curling up with one of my books instead of talking about them.
Artist Friendships and Sacred Spaces
I was at the dinner table with my new Fargo, North Dakota friend and her family, when I looked around at their curious faces. . .They were all characters from my friend’s memoir, So Many Africas, and it was like going back stage on a film set and interviewing the cast.
Historian of the South
The 86 year old paused when I asked how many books he had written. He looked down at first, then up toward the ceiling as if retrieving that bit of information. Then, with a voice laden with his native Alabama, he answered, “I think it’s 34.”
Remembering Katrina Pets
A series of urgent questions on a late August weekend in 2005 determined the fate of a quarter of a million pets in America. . . . For the third time in six weeks, residents had to ask, “Do we go? Do we stay? What are our options?” Every pet’s life depended on how their people answered.