I was born the same year that Watership Down, my favorite book when I was a teenager, was published. Since I’ve had to give up chocolate, I adore extra-premium vanilla ice cream smothered with sea salt caramel sauce. I buy far more books than I will ever be able to read during my lifetime. I spent my middle school years filling spiral notebooks with fan fiction starring my friends and the members of Duran Duran. Returning books to the library is deeply satisfying. When I was eight, I fell in love with snow and winter. Even now, I won’t agree to live anywhere without snow. I like to daydream about a job I once saw posted at an animal sanctuary: Kitten Caregiver. My favorite place to hide was a fort I made in the woods. Somehow, in my memory, the three or four branches I leaned against a tree have been transformed into something elaborate, roofed, hobbity. I can still smell the metallic scent of rain falling at the end of a hot summer day. It was only last year that I learned there is a word for that smell. I have 7,616 photos of cats on my camera roll. I still enjoy the comfort breakfast of my childhood, a hot bowl of salty buttered grits.
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My theme for Slice of Life 2022 is finding inspiration in the writing of others. Each day I plan to find my slice in someone else’s words or forms. Today’s inspiration came from Angela’s Rambling Autobiography at Slowing Down the Moments. The Rambling Autobiography is a prompt that may be familiar to many from Linda Rief. I first saw it in Kim Stafford’s wonderful book on writing, The Muses Among Us.
the dirigible plum 
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