Writing With Abandon

Reflections and ramblings about life as an educator, writer, reader, knitter, and over-thinker. Trying to do the writing only I can do.

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about

I’m Amy. A born and raised New Yorker, currently living in Miami. Here to reflect on my experiences as an educator and learner, working things out as I write.

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  • Correspondence

    I’m reading The Correspondent by Virginia Evans and it’s one of those books you know you’ll want to reread. I wish I’d had a pen with me throughout to underline those sticky sentences (oh, there are so many!), but I’ve been reading from bed or on the couch in the mornings after breakfast and before…

  • Delete Today’s Photos

    Every day, one of my reminders reads: “📸 Delete today’s photos.” Usually while I eat breakfast, sometime after I’ve done the NYT word games, I search for today’s date in my iPhone photos album and scroll through the photos to see what’s there and what I can delete, if anything. The reminder started back in…

  • No AC

    It must have happened on Thursday. I woke up drenched in sweat, confused by the feeling. I haven’t had night sweats in months, not since starting to dress warmer (isn’t that strange?), not unless I was sick like in January with fever, unable to lift my head. P wasn’t home, and I figured it was…

  • The Spell of the Yukon

    This evening, at the end of our last full day in the Yukon, Quinn read Robert W. Service’s poem, “The Spell of the Yukon,” to the 37 students we’ve had the pleasure of getting to know this week. Everyone was silent as he read in his booming voice, taking us through the mountains and valleys…

  • I’m Still Standing

    An airport at 5:30am is a sleepy place. Luckily, Miami isn’t seemingly experiencing the same TSA delays, and there certainly weren’t any ICE agents supporting with security. I don’t want to think about why that is right now. There’s music playing low, a kind of soft pop. I can hear the sound of coffee grinding,…

  • Slicing While Waiting For Dinner

    It was a busy day. Woke up at 6 — so tired! Why? I got almost 8 hours… Phoebe’s grooming appointment at 8am. A new mobile groomer. He was great and she came back looking spiffy. An 8:30am call with a new client in Cairo. From Iowa just like Tim! Three proposal requests. 10am meeting…

  • Toilet Trees

    “I still need to paaaaack,” I say. We’re sitting at a table at Books & Books. The waiter has finally taken our order and I’m hangry. V is coloring a blue bed on the paper we brought from home. “You still have tomorrow though,” P says. “Yeah, but I work, and I don’t want to…

  • Friend Family

    Starting the morning with so much gratitude. Even though last night’s wine makes me feel groggier than I would have liked, kept me from sleeping in later than I would have wanted. An unreal balcony, like a whole separate room, seemingly custom-built for this couple. A delicious dinner, barbecued with care by Jason. A table…

  • The Hour Before Writing Group

    Ana sends the message to our Slicers WhatsApp chat on Wednesday: “Hi slicers, I’m hosting tomorrow’s writing group on Zoom. If you feel like writing together, I’d love to have you!” The last and only other time I came to the Thursday writing group was on a Thursday that I worked late and was super…

  • Soft-Boiled Goodness

    When I read Consuelo’s slice, The Egg Thingy, I knew I’d already been influenced. An easy, no-clean method for perfect-every-time soft-boiled, medium-boiled, and hard-boiled eggs? Sign me up. And they even made a smaller version. Perfect. I ordered it last Saturday and it arrived Sunday morning, just in time for breakfast. I was so excited…