Author: Brenda Bellinger

When I was about fourteen and having a cavity filled, I must have flinched. Rather than give me a little more anesthetic, the dentist gripped my jaw firmly and kept drilling. As a result, it took me most of the rest of my life to find a dentist I was comfortable with. Not “comfortable” as […]

I’d forgotten what it felt like to wake up feeling cocooned, with the soft, insulating patter of rain outside the window. It’s been quite a while since we’ve had to think about the pathways that divert floodwaters around our rural property. The old drainage ditches and culverts had been neglected but the general topography of […]

Speaking of language (okay, an admittedly weak segue from the last post—not that there needs to be one), I sometimes find myself looking up new words that are increasingly being tossed around in conversation or in print. “Gaslighting” and “woke” are two examples that I thought I understood the meaning of but wanted to be […]

As the year winds down and we prepare to celebrate our winter holidays, I wonder what 2023 will bring us. If I were to write a “resolution wish list,” it would include an end to the senseless war in Ukraine, along with a unified global strategy to arrest climate change and implement an immediate program […]

After I’d announced my retirement a few years back, a co-worker made a chain out of paper clips (one for each remaining day at work) and hung it from a hook on the back of the door to my office. “Remove one every day,” she said. Often, I find myself wondering what events might take […]

I’m fortunate and grateful to belong to two groups of wonderful writing women. Each of the groups have been together for over sixteen years. We meet monthly, usually exchanging prompts beforehand and we encourage each other in our writing endeavors. Over the years, as we’ve shared our stories and life challenges, long-lasting friendships have formed. […]

Dia de los Muertos 2022 When my grandmother passed away a long time ago, the only words she left behind were her handwritten recipes which I still treasure. She wasn’t one to write letters or send cards. If you’d asked me, I would have told you that my father was a man of few words. […]

In recent years, it seems the closest I’ve come to a palette of fall colors in Northern California is my collection of Le Creuset cookware. Not this year though. I’m writing from Tennessee where I’m enjoying seeing pumpkins on porches next to white Adirondack chairs and the blaze of autumn colors everywhere. Schools in this […]

Remember ticket stubs? Those little souvenirs that would remind you of a place, a time, a special event, someone you were with. Once a year, before he became a family man and moved out of state, my eldest son used to take me to an Oakland A’s baseball game—just he and I. It was something […]

It may sound silly or self-indulgent, but coffee has become my anchor. It centers me, any time of day. What used to be a rushed part of my morning routine is now a moment of calm in a sea of chaos. Sanctuary in a cup. And it’s an essential element when contemplating a blank screen! […]