Time has expanded into an eternal present, engulfing the past and the future like a large two-way tsunami. I guess that’s how it always is, really, but mostly, when I’m bustling about going from work to more work to making dinner to worrying about bills/upcoming taxes/my disengaged daughter [insert frantic worry here] it seems likeContinue reading “Notes from the Pandemic: There is only the present”
Tag Archives: reflections
On the Illusion of Communication
“The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”- George Bernard Shaw I’ve always thought of myself as a good communicator. I thought I was doing awesome. I could string those sentences together like nobody’s business. I was sending out clear messages to the world! Yeah, right. That illusion heldContinue reading “On the Illusion of Communication”
On my Toxic Relationship to Time
I was listening to the On Being podcast the other day and I heard a phrase that struck me the way a mallet hits a gong. It was one of the last interviews the poet and philosopher, John O’Donohue, gave before his untimely death in 2008. It is worth listening to and then listening toContinue reading “On my Toxic Relationship to Time”
We Are All Octopuses
I read a book a few months ago entitled The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration into the Wonder of Consciousness. I had never given much thought to octopuses before, but it turns out they are remarkable, completely alien creatures. Here is how the author of the book, Sy Montgomery describes them: “Here isContinue reading “We Are All Octopuses”
A Hellish Year, Part 2: On Reflections and Not Existing
The most castrating thing J said to me this last year was, “Lina, you’re a wonderful woman.” Oh, there were things, small cruelties that might on the surface seem worse, especially as most of them were untrue. But the, “Lina , you’re a wonderful woman” comment stung the most. Why, you may ask? That seems likeContinue reading “A Hellish Year, Part 2: On Reflections and Not Existing”
Lina Branter 