by Marjorie Campbell
I love to ride. I love to shove my feet into the pedals, slot my carefully-filled water bottle, start the bike-o-meter and head off. The display shows my speed, my RPM, my time and calories spent. A little white towel wraps my neck to catch the sweat my headband misses.

Rating: 5.0/5

by Marjorie Campbell
Every year I go away. Some years I go with girlfriends; some years, alone. Typically I hike, one foot in front of another. Most often, these trips follow a mountain ridge near water where I plunge to wash away heat and sweat. I want to say, "My hiking trips are wonderfully productive." But they are not - I move through a chink of time, a speck of space with perfumed breezes. Scaly, peeling trees and thrills of sudden rain on an obscured way.

Rating: 5.0/5

by Marjorie Campbell
When I grow up, I want to be my sister-in-law. It's true that I am 53 but she has a few years on me. I am married to one of her husband's brothers who's 18 months older than him. Both husbands have a much younger brother who is actually my age. We are all mixed up in this way, which may be part of the reason I think I am still growing up.

Rating: 5.0/5

by Marjorie Campbell
We cannot escape it. Our children will become writers and we will read their words, like it or not. My first brutal encounter with this consequence of education occurred early in Will's second year of grade school. The teacher provided to our newly literate son a list of words with instructions, "Make a sentence with each word. Spell each word the way it sounds." Will, confronted with the word "large" submitted, "My farder haz a large stomak."

Rating: 5.0/5