Someone I knew years ago had a particular way of saying think. I'm not going to tell you what it was. I've been saving it for a T-shirt for about twenty-five years. The first time I heard the expression, I didn't understand what it meant. I just liked the way it sounded. The words themselves were ordinary. Nothing remarkable about any of them individually.

My next-door neighbor rang the bell last night and asked if I had a shovel. Then we looked at each other. "It's been quite a day," she said. Actually, we agreed, it had been quite a week. We stood there for a few minutes comparing notes before I remembered something important. "But I digress. You need a shovel." Then I remembered something else.

It was raining when I came around the curve and found a car stopped in the road. Our street is narrow. One lane in each direction, with enough curves that getting around a postal vehicle, trash truck, or the tail end of a car sticking too far out of a driveway can become a small sporting event. So I slowed down.

I almost had a collision at the grocery store yesterday. Almost. I was coming out of an aisle into the larger main aisle when I pulled up short. A couple was approaching with their cart, so I stopped to let them pass. The woman stopped too. "No, no. Come on out." I thanked her and started forward. Then her husband leaned toward me and said, quietly enough to sound conspiratorial but loudly enough for his wife to hear, "Be careful.

I think I liked the watch more than he ever did. That probably isn't the way most keepsake stories begin, but it's the truth. Years ago, I was looking for a gift for my husband when I found it online. It wasn't extravagant or rare. It was simply... different. Rectangular instead of round. Something about its shape caught my attention. I could picture him carrying it.

For years, there was a small barrel-shaped bag in the bottom of my closet. It wasn't particularly beautiful. In fact, it was quite horrifically ugly. It certainly wasn't valuable. It was simply where a few things that mattered quietly lived. Inside was my Nana's beaded flapper purse. And a crucifix. I learned much later that it was probably a pectoral crucifix.

I could not see the train from my bedroom. I didn't need to. About a mile and a quarter from our house, the railroad crossed the end of our road. During the day, the flashing lights stopped traffic while freight trains lumbered through town. Every now and then, a passenger train would appear, racing past so quickly it felt as though it had somewhere much more important to be.

I do not sit in my Nana's rocking chair. This is strange because it is probably the sturdiest chair in the house. The original cushion is gone now, replaced long ago by another. One small nail occasionally reminds the unwary that time has passed. A blanket rests across the seat, less for decoration than protection. Reusable grocery bags sometimes hang from the back.

My mug had developed veins. At least that's what I called them. Thin, branching lines appeared inside the cup over time, spreading beneath the glaze like tiny rivers on a map. At first, they were barely noticeable. Later, they collected traces of tea, becoming darker and easier to see. I loved that mug. It arrived as part of one of those international subscription kits that promised a small connection to another part of the world.

I cannot remember a time before the green bowl. It is small, made of plastic, and entirely unremarkable to anyone who didn't grow up with it. Total kitsch. I remember eating applesauce from it when I was a child. I remember seeing it in kitchen cabinets and on countertops. I remember it moving from one house to another. What I do not remember is where it came from.

I am standing on my deck talking to a piece of glass. Not tapping. Not typing. Talking. A few moments from now, I will walk back into my office, sit down at my desk, and find that thought, that conversation waiting for me on a computer inside the house. I understand enough about technology to know it works. I also think it's magic.

I still have the key to my first car. A Ford Fiesta that disappeared while I was away at college. My father sold it without telling me. I came home one weekend and the car was simply gone. No farewell drive. No conversation. No chance to stand in the driveway and decide whether I was ready to let it go.

There was a period of time when the purse lived inside a paper bag. Not a preservation box. Not tissue paper. Not behind glass. A crumpled, brown, oilpaper bag, tucked inside a steamer trunk discovered in my Nana’s old chicken coop after she died. Also inside the trunk was a velvet dress with small sections chewed through by mice. I have a photograph of my Nana wearing it sometime around 1920.

Some things, some experiences, are held in the heartlong before they are held in the hand. We think about them.Assign meaning to them.Wait for the right version of ourselves to arrive first. And then sometimes, almost by accident,the body enters the conversation. The weight is different than expected.The balance feels unfamiliar.A hand reaches for the object automatically anyway.

There are spaces where we begin translatingbefore anyone has asked a question. We soften the edges.Clarify the meaning.Adjust the language until it feels easier to receive. Not because it is false,but because experience has taught uswhat happens when we do not. Some translations are generous. Others are survival. A way of moving through roomswhere being misunderstood feels inevitable.

There are things we hold ontolong after they stop holding us. Not because they are still alive,but because we remember when they were. We stay.We adjust.We look for a way to remain. Even when the signals are clear. A door that does not open.An experience that moves forward without us.A conversation that shifts, just slightly, out of reach.

There are times when nothing is wrong. No conflict.No failure.Nothing to point to and say, this is why. And still, something has changed. A child grows,and the shoes that once fitbegin to press in all the wrong places. The shoes are not the problem.The child is not the problem. They no longer match. It is easy to look for a reason.

Knowing Abbie, published in 2018 via Black Opal Books, first edition.Written under the author's former pen name (AR Neal), this text is no longer in print; while there may be copies available through

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There are things we want to do. Small things.Quiet things. And then, just as quickly,something shifts. Not resistance, exactly.Just a soft turning away. It would be easier not to do it or not to go.To skip it, to stay.To let the moment pass. Nothing would be lost, exactly. But something would be missed. So we go forward.

There is a moment when the body reacts. A tightening, low and immediate.Something in the belly that saysthis will not land. You will be seen as off.As distant.As someone who does not quite fit. So…

What is it about distraction? It’s easy to name it as the problem:a lack of focus, a wandering mind, too many inputs. But distraction is rarely the starting point. Disconnection comes first. A subtle separation from what is in front of us.From the task, the moment, the body, the reason we began. Once that thread loosens, attention looks for something to hold.

There’s something about a system that almost works. One system settles.The other needs adjustment. Again. And again. Not broken.Not unusable.Just slightly off. It keeps asking for attention. At some point, the question isn’t how to fix it. It’s whether it’s meant to settle at all.

The article here isn't just for those in the C-suite or who are "the boss" at work. It's for all of us. Take a moment. Read it. Leneker is on to something. Is "work" just that? Or is it a passion? There's of course nothing wrong with working to work: doing so keeps the lights on and a morsel in the cupboard. But what if there was a way to feel a bit of those passion endorphins when it's "just work"? It's possible. Find your joy.

People struggle with performance. — Not performance in the obvious sense—presentations, visibility, results. Something quieter. The performance of being: clear steady collaborative in control The performance of knowing what they’re doing while they’re still figuring it out. — You can build an entire career inside that performance. You can be rewarded for it. You can even convince yourself it’s real.

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