Ice cream is the most popular summer dessert. Hot fudge sundaes and root beer floats may fill our individual memories, but they also occupy our collective pop culture past and present. How many scenes from television and films or lines from songs feature ice cream… Read More »Ice Cream and the Invention of Summer, Part III
There’s so much to say about ice cream! When I first decided to write about creativity and this frosty treat, I assumed it would be one short essay to refresh my readers from the summer heat. I still hope that my writing about ice cream… Read More »Ice Cream and the Invention of Summer, Part II
The old-fashioned Dairy Queen of my childhood hometown exclusively served ice cream treats. You ordered at a sliding window, and if you wanted to sit down with your soft serve, you could do so at a couple of picnic tables under the shade of a… Read More »Ice Cream and the Invention of Summer, Part I
The phrase “a year of play” may conjure visions of a long vacation at a seaside villa with alternating sessions of building sandcastles and drinking tropical cocktails. This has not been my experience so far, although I have had some fun and a good amount… Read More »A Year of Play: A Six-Month Update
I have lived most of my life in places where fireflies are uncommon. Then I moved to Indiana, whose official state insect is a species of lightning bug. Who knew that states even had official insects! I’m now lucky enough to live close to a… Read More »Lightning Bugs and a Return to Nature
The musical Grease (not the film, but the stage production), begins at the 20-year class reunion of the Rydell High School Class of 1959. The characters on stage for the event are Miss Lynch (the English teacher), Eugene Florczyk (the nerdy valedictorian), and Patty Simcox… Read More »Reunions and the Creative Messiness of Memory
I have a loved one with dementia. Maybe you do, too. Each case is so different that it is difficult to say much of anything that is universal about the broad range of diseases classified under the umbrella term. I write this post from my… Read More »Dementia, Coping, and Creativity
I recently went to a live reading by Neil Gaiman, an author of immense imagination. Even if you don’t recognize his name, you probably know his work. His writing spans a variety of genres, from novels to comics, and much of it has been adapted… Read More »Superpowers of Creativity and the Work of Neil Gaiman
The question of what it means to feel “at home” has been on my mind lately. Last year, my family moved from one region of the country to another. Our new residence doesn’t quite feel like home yet, but I know that the process often… Read More »Being Home, Getting Distance, and Creating in the Balance
The common perception of time as unchangeable allows little room for creativity. We are trapped in a world in which “time marches on.” Or are we? Against the general view (and perhaps against logic), I contend that time is the perfect medium for creativity. Unpacking… Read More »Chronology and Other Myths: Creativity with Time