Tag Archives: life

Flowing

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So I probably owe you loyal readers an explanation about my four-month hiatus. We will get to that, but for today let me tell you what jolted me back to this part of my writing life.

Bliss.

Since December 2025 I’ve been moving houses, trying to get someone acting like a madman out of one of them, juggling hard writing deadlines, and working to create a successful path for my successor through my slightly unique day job.

All work and no play–except that Japan trip. During the Japan trip, on the last full day before we flew the next night, my dad died. It was not unexpected; he had left us long ago through Alzheimer’s. But the physical death was sudden, so there was nothing for my friend and fellow traveler in Japan Amelia and I to do but come home at the planned time.

When I got home, a few details to clean up meant I last wrote to you March 11. And then my brain kinda shut down. I’m still producing radio stories. I’m still conducting interviews on the Hurricane Helene book for a December manuscript deadline. And I have spoken with an Appalachian-based press about the Eviction book (tentatively titled No Good Deed) detailing what happened when we invited That Guy to live in our second home. Which is now my primary home. That and a book about Food Insecurity in Appalachia will be next.

But what I really want to tell you about today is my friend Amelia’s casual life-lifting comment “My friend Caroline is inviting some women to sit in the river; let’s go.” The New River is very shallow in many places, not least near the hydro dam in Fries (pronounced Freeze for those of you who paused here). We took sunscreen, hats, and chairs, and went down to the river to play.

This was my first meeting with Caroline, an engaging soul whose word count might approximate 500 per minute. She is a good storyteller so that was fun. We were sitting in shallow water something between swimming pool and bathwater in temperature, so that was delightful. Little fish schools swam around us, so that was diverting; we contemplated losing our water shoes for impromptu pedicures.

It was a relaxing couple of hours, and they did not so much speed past as flow gently. When we left I found I had been sitting doing nothing but enjoying the flow of words and the flow of water for more than two hours.

Amelia and I got dinner, I went home, lay down, and slept for 12 hours, rising only once to properly prepare for bed after having been in it awhile.

Bliss, I tell you. I had no idea how tired I was, how sick I was of moving stuff between houses in preparation for moving to Scotland. How stressed I was over moving all the logistics of the healthcare nonprofit to a new mind, fresh and eager but unaware of details unless I imparted them.

We will talk later of the iron clad lease now in place (1500 words and counting) for the people staying in my wilderness property. Of our concern that our house in town is not selling. Of my disappoint at not getting an awesome job that I was a finalist for two years ago. They checked my references, then went with a man from DC, transplanted him to Appalachia, and expected all to be well. He blew out 14 months later. They didn’t offer my interview this time. That’s more about them than me and I know it, so let it flow away. Scotland ho. We have a small apartment overlooking the ocean in Stonehaven awaiting.

More later, but just know I missed sharing the small sweet moments that make up the bigness of life with you. Hope you are doing well, and hang in there if not. The water will eventually wash it away.

Japan: Please Send Bail Money

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Amelia and I have racked up quite an impressive list of cultural faux paus and international criminal activity since arriving in Japan. Here are some fun facts so you can avoid arrest.

There are no public trash cans. You buy it, you carry it until you get to your home, hotel, hostel, what have you. In desperation once, I stuffed a leftover plastic container in the corner of an obscure toilet in a remote area – and waited for the sirens to go off. The postal boxes in Japan wear signs saying more or less “Yo, westerners, this is not a trash can.”

Several of our crimes involved toilets. We were desperate to reach one at an unstaffed train station, and our Suica card (the subway pass) activated the barriers on the exit machines. We pushed on through because, toilets. We believe we committed a $4 crime, not paying for that train ride.

Toilets in Japan are intimidating. They come with a long row of buttons whose symbols and names are equally bewildering to the Japanese kangi characters accompanying them.

One has musical notes and says ‘privacy.’ I thought “Well, a little music would be fun,” so pushed it.  Waterfall noises began; it’s so you can poop without disturbing your neighbor.

The privacy feature will auto-activate. I discovered this the morning after our spectacular Indian curry meal—the results of which were equally spectacular.

The buttons on the toilet led to our next international incident. Amelia took me to this swank department store (the Japanese Saks Fifth Avenue) where they keep a constant display of goldfish. For $20 you can walk amongst them for an hour and that’s the best $20 I ever spent. Photos tomorrow.

But the toilets in that café offered a dazzling array of support features (plus those fabulous heated seats; Japanese toilets feel so good when you’ve been walking all day, like little rest stops for weary bones).

When I started trying the smorgasbord of features, water shot up parts of me that don’t normally get that treatment; I pushed the privacy button to drown my yelping. Then I couldn’t find the off button, but inadvertently appear to have found the call attendant button, because one of the four Japanese words I know is “help” and the lady standing outside my toilet door a moment later was definitely asking if I needed any.

I finally got the buttons turned off—including, unfortunately, “Flush.” That was not one of my four words, so explaining to the long line of well-heeled women waiting their turn was difficult. “The American broke the toilet” I am pretty sure one of them said over her shoulder. They shot me sympathetic-to-hostile looks as I slunk out.

A lesser amount of slinking accompanied our ride on the bullet train this morning. Shinkansen trains require supplemental tickets; as they were heavily booked Amelia and I got the last seats of 10 B and 11 B—because the center seat is never cool. We boarded to a wall of blackness- and not just hair and suits. When you get on public transport in Japan you realize just how little color people wear. Except the pubescent girls. That’s a different thing altogether. Everyone else is in shades of black and grey, and of course most Japanese people have black hair.

The businessmen—to a man; we were the only women and the only foreigners in that train car—glared at us. Maybe because my Hello Kitty laptop case is pink. Or because after four days in Tokyo souvenir shopping we could no longer fit our shoes into our backpacks, so had them tied outside. I tried not to hit the guy in 11A in the face with my tennis shoes as I deposited my overstuffed bags overhead, sat down, and pulled out my crocheting.

Since I now have three pieces of luggage and the train was only stopping for a minute at our destination, I started gathering stuff five minutes before. Which meant I wound up facing backwards standing up with bags in my seat, while the men on either side of my tried very hard to pretend none of this was happening. They wore suits, had laptops, and did not want to be associated with my weirdness in any way.

But as I rode backwards like a puppy with her head out the window, a guy several seats along looked up from his laptop, did a double take, and then pulled down his mask to grin at me. Well okay, then. If the Zombies showed up on this Train to Busan, we’d team up with him. At least he wouldn’t throw us to the flesh eaters first to save himself, not like the rest of these guys.

We descended at a tiny little place called Gokan and discovered we would have 96 minutes to enjoy the snowcapped mountain vistas around us, because the bus to our hotel wasn’t coming until then. Ah well. A slowdown after Tokyo will be nice. So long as the law doesn’t catch up with us. Or any of those guys from that bullet train.