El† muerto más famoso de Houston†

Yo† fui† al cementerio† Glenwood† el viernes† pasado† con mi esposa† Ela† y mi hijo Constantin†. Llegamos cuando se prendían los regadores automáticos.† No vimos a través del agua esparcida por las boquillas del césped y el viento alacre del atardecer ningún arcoíris que reluciera bajo la luz de la […]

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Mi constitución

Yo, Iván Brave, soy un ciudadano de doble nacionalidad, con el lujo de llamarme “americano” sin ofender a nadie, aunque suelo ofender a muchos, pues nací de padres argentinos en Houston, Texas, EEUU, es decir, mi constitución consiste en América del norte y en América del sur, da lo mismo, […]

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En Europa también hubo amor

Recuerdo a mi abuela, abriendo el último cajón de su escritorio, antes de morir. “Te las regalo si querés”. Tenía en sus manos la Torre Eiffel, la Fontana di Trevi, la Sagrada Familia . . . es decir, me entregaba como doce docenas de cartas postales, que ella y mi […]

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What is Fiction, what is Not?

I open at random one of my favorite books of Nonfiction, Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands.   Page 41: Half and Half There was a muchacha who lived near my house. La gente del pueblo talked about her being una de las ortras, “of the Others.” They said that for six months […]

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The Blue House, Episode 2: Proportions

Beth Kephart: It’s one thing to take a measuring tape to a set of architectural blueprints and announce a series of dimensions. It’s quite another to think and write of a house proportionately. What was small and what was large, and in relationship to what, precisely? Think of the work […]

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The Blue House, Episode 1: Intro

“Installed in the moment. Awash with history.” That’s what writer Beth Kephart says about our childhood homes. And it is the line pushing me to post about this topic.   A quick authorial note, I did not just happen on the article. But our instructor, and fellow doctoral student at […]

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Target Practice

All around me: the crisp cool morning air, permeating the two exterior walls of my childhood bedroom; my wife in the room with me, tapping out the voice-over to her newest YT video; my sister downstairs singing to the dogs; the periwinkle blue carpet holding me up; a warm mate, […]

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The Writer’s Lexicon: Went . . . -em- !

First, a charm. Second, a blast. Third, no prob. Forth and fifth too.   But then came sixth period. A monster of a period. What do employees want to do their last hour? The bad ones slack off. The good ones sprint. Either way we expend our pent up oodles […]

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The Writer’s Lexicon: Turn Very

Just a word. Any word.   The class wouldn’t respond, weren’t responding.   What starts with the letter P?   Silence, followed by cell phone screen tapping and eye lash twirling.   What about A? . . . A?   One student’s lips trembled. I figured, that’s a start.   […]

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The Writer’s Lexicon: Shrug Sigh Think

Man, got home with a terrible headache! Backache. I’m sitted (seated) crisscross at the floor of my childhood bedroom, pounding away at the keys. Welp, here it is, another installment of . . . VOCAB IMPROVEMENT.   Today I read about the three words in the title of this post. […]

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The Writer’s Lexicon: Nod, Noisy, Said, Sat, SMH

Today I would like to try something different. Instead of blurting out one exercise paragraph after the other, I figured to write about my day at school. The goal is the the same: avoid instances of the title irritations. No nodding. No “noisy” or “loud.” No Said! And No sitting […]

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Who Are You? [Birthday Post]

This exercise comes from the James Scott Bell’s plot book, but it hit me so hard I decided to treat it as something separate. Basically, Mr Bell takes the old adage, “Write what you know,” and makes it, “Write who you are.” It sounds almost Julia Camerom-esque. When you invest […]

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View of Social Media 2020

In a few words: wtf.   Let’s just start by saying Instagram misses me and I miss Instagram. I can’t even bring myself to reply to my meme groups, because I don’t have the energy to sift through related pages these days and report. Plus it was so fun to […]

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dream job

Dream Job(s)

When I was a kid, I dreamed of being the main character of a video game. The game was about saving a princess, helping helpless villagers, and destroying the evil green-faced bad guy, who would stop at nothing to gain absolute power. He was powerful enough as is, but he […]

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