The forest is big and wide.
It happens at times. You run dry, the words don’t come out and you don’t know what to write. So you don’t.
Nothing goes down on paper.
A few starts peter out and you look around for inspiration as a writer. You travel to the coast, to a beach house in a forest of pine trees, to try to write a story, to write anything.
A flicker comes… then it goes.
You’re tired from your work as a journalist and as a father of three. So you let it rest and you don’t write, you sit in the garden-cum-forest. You play with your children and you fix a leaky faucet. You kick the soccer ball really high and your youngest daughter, who is three, laughs and says, “Again.” You do it again. And she says, “Now catch it on your head!” You do. It hurts. But her laugh mends all. It is a full and hearty laugh, and it is just what you needed. So you round up the kids and off you go to the sand dunes in the forest behind your house in Pinamar on the coast of Argentina. And you climb to the heights of the dunes and you jump down and roll and tumble and fall. Your shoes fill with sand and so do your pockets and your ears and your hair. [continue reading…]
Can’t figure out what’s for dinner? First buy a flower, then think about what you will cook.
“What shall we have for dinner?”
My wife asks me this a lot.
I am not sure why because I always tense up when she asks me the question. I think hard about what the answer should be, even after being married for 11 years. I rack my brain to try to guess what is on her mind. The meal has to be easy and quick because it’s getting late and the three kids are getting testy. And it mustn’t be pasta because that’s what I always say.
Half of the time the question is rhetorical – she answers it herself. And I sigh with relief.
The rest of the time is like now. She asks the question and then stares at me with a face that says, “Well?”
At these times my mind always draws a blank on anything but gnocchis, raviolis and spaghettis.
So I mutter my response as a meek question: “Pasta?” [continue reading…]
Go on, take it up. Surfing is good fun.
Endurance came to my mind the other day.
I’d just ridden a long wave into the beach after nearly two hours of surfing. The winds were blowing offshore and the waves pushing in from the South Atlantic, big and powerful. It was one of the best days of summer.
I was beaming – and totally exhausted.
I thought about shouting out my joy to a surfer friend and a few of his buddies on the beach, but I just smiled and said, “Hey.”
We spoke about the good surf and I maintained my surfer composure even though I don’t really look the part anymore at 44 and with a protruding belly.
I’ve been surfing since I was 12 and I don’t plan to stop.
Well, not for long. [continue reading…]
