ArcaMax

It's really easy to complain on Facebook and offer no solutions. It's a touch harder to speak directly to the city council and air your grievances. It's harder still to go to the town hall filled with armed police to point fingers and explain that your tax dollars pay for their salary.

It was the city's second police town hall. As I settled in ...Read more

It was the squeals of the two women that caught my attention first. They were cheering on a pigtailed girl on the kiddo swing, the swing where you stick your feet through and the seat wraps around your waist. The women, maybe mom and aunt, hooted and reminded the girl to stretch her legs out as she swung forward to gain momentum. It was a ...Read more

You can never know who is behind the door, but you try to take the cues from the yard. There are the homes with the porch add-ons you know were made by weekend warriors. You see the American-flavored decor or the lack of any personalization with patches of dead grass. I always appreciate an overabundance of gnomes because of the mismatched ...Read more

One of the most desirable examples of magic from the "Harry Potter" series wasn't a spell. It was the Time-Turner, a necklace with which one could reverse time by twirling an hourglass. This was how the studious character Hermione could attend multiple classes at one time; her intellect wouldn't be hampered by something as silly as there being ...Read more

My son apologized for not being part of the planning committee in his first-grade class. During the lockdown, some of the others gathered together to decide what they would do if the shooter came into their classroom, and how they might be able to fight back. My son told me he had sat holding hands with another little girl and cried instead.

A ...Read more

In the last few weeks, I've been getting more informed about my city, meeting different people and learning how many people are connected by these invisible lines of social connection. I've also found in which ways obvious things aren't connected.

Last week, during my city's Parks and Recreation Advisory Board meeting (a board I've sat on for ...Read more

In a year, the only real dicey interaction came during dinner with a parent of my kids' friend. He offered wine. I declined, lifting the water glass to indicate it was enough. A little later came another offer. Then another. Then he pointedly asked, "But, you do drink, right?" I told him that I had drunk enough.

And that's the truth. ...Read more

There had been struggles to get him to taekwondo, especially during the summer. He had some actual reasons to skip out, like a fantastic case of tonsillitis. And, when the car thermometer read around 105 degrees, there might have been a time or two that a mom override might have happened. But he slowly started to lose enthusiasm on his own, ...Read more

The two young welders were told to show me around as I interviewed them. They showed me the stairs they welded together in the big construction bay. One asked me if I knew the guardrails near one of the new grocery stores, ones that would keep cars from driving into the arroyo as they came down a hill. I told him I did.

"Every time I see them ...Read more

My husband found her on Craigslist. Maybe the owner was a veteran, or maybe just wore camo pants; my memory isn't the freshest. What we did know is that he got the dog before learning that his apartment complex didn't allow animals. He tearfully asked us to take care of her, send a picture or two, and after we gave him 50 bucks, he trotted away....Read more

It took me a few seconds to realize what I saw at the base of the trees surrounding the party's venue. It was the light of fireflies, blinking on and off as they hovered through the brush. I had never seen them before, and I was struck by the magic of the place created at the base of the trees and not back at the party, where the music was loud ...Read more