Why are you so petrified of silence? Here can you handle this? Did you think about your bills, your ex, your deadlines? Or when you think you're gonna die? Or did you long for the next distraction? Sometimes I like to talk. Sometimes I like to listen. Sometimes I like the distraction of music. Sometimes I crave silence. I'm acutely aware of the messages that silence brings us. I think that we learn more about ourselves and other people through silence than through the distraction of conversation.

I showed up work yesterday with my curly, unwashed hair pulled on top of my head in a wild ponytail sticking out all over my head, an over-sized t-shirt, black jeans, and the unmistakable look of a the six hours of sleep I'd had in the last two days hanging in the shadows around my eyes. Everyone who looked at me smiled politely. I was just happy to be standing upright. It's no secret that I live my life in a blur of activity that would make mere mortals crumble. I mean, it's no secret that I will sometimes knock out a four page essay for a class, stay up half the night talking to someone, teach my students on two hours of sleep, and finish the afternoon with a five mile run. I like it that way. Yesterday, though, I reached my own breaking point after having one more wrench thrown in the spokes of my life. My dear friend across the hall wandered into my room, sat across from my desk, and took in the sight that belied my own brand of chaos. When he asked, "What's wr...

I'm currently obsessed with the Modest Mouse lyric "when time and life shook hands and said good-bye." The imagery in that line--and in that song as he describes the ocean meeting the sky and the earth folding in on itself--has been stuck in my head since I first heard Mark Kozelec sing it on his MM tribute album, which happens to be one of my all-time favorites. I cannot listen to this song without crying. Sometimes the tears form in tiny wells along the bottom edges of my eyes that do little more than temporarily blur my vision. Other times--like today--the tears overflow onto my cheekbones, accompanied by slight hiccups. The soul of an artist is keenly aware of the fact that life is temporary. Regardless of your religious beliefs about the afterlife, our time walking the earth and breathing the air is limited, and we are powerless to stop it. This truth reverberates through my own psyche in nearly every moment of my life. It was there this week as I sat cross-legged ...