Seaside Escape in Essaouira

It was many and many a year ago,/ In the kingdom by the sea,/ That a maiden there lived whom you may know /By the name of Annabel Lee.–Edgar Allen Poe Oh, baby, baby, it’s a wild world/I’ll always remember you like a child, girl.   —Cat Stevens Last weekend I discovered the writing retreat of my dreams. My heart, churning like the waves beneath…

Weekends in the Village

After a long workweek and Friday night on the square, a girl living in a tourist town sometimes needs a quiet, country retreat. Palmeraie Village Residence, 20 minutes from the Medina, is family friendly and Girls’ –Weekend- great. On my daily ride to work through the Palmeraie region, I see palm groves, saddled camels, and dirt bikers popping wheelies. On my Saturday ride to…

Friday Night Lights: Jemaa el Fna Square

They were women who wore brightly coloured djellabas with silky hoods halfway down their backs, and their hands and feet were covered in an intricate web of design. ‘Tattoos,’ Bea whispered. ‘Henna,’ the woman nearest me laughed, noticing my fascinated stare.-–Esther Freud, Hideous Kinky Last Friday my friend, Jasna, and I returned to Jemaa el Fna where Esther Freud, great granddaughter of Sigmund Freud,…

Walking in Carrie Bradshaw’s Shoes: Sahara Palace Tribute

So glad I did what I’ve told my students to do every year since I first saw, then began showing to them, Dead Poets Society. This move to Morocco is about “seizing the day.” Before moving from Nashville, I finally looked up from grading papers to see my teens standing on their desks and saluting me with an “Oh Captain, My Captain.” Teaching is…

New School

The great teachers fill you up with hope and shower you with a thousand reasons to embrace all aspects of life… The world of literature has everything in it, and it refuses to leave anything out. I have read like a man on fire my whole life because the genius of English teachers touched me with the dazzling beauty of language. Because of them…

First Week in Morocco: Part 2

The only real failure is the failure to try – and the measure of success is how we cope with disappointment – as we always must. We came here – and we tried – all of us in our different ways. Can we be blamed for feeling that we’re too old to change – too scared of disappointment to do it all again? We…

First Week in Morocco: Part 1

All we know about the future is that it will be different. But perhaps what we fear is that it will be the same. So we must celebrate the changes. Because, as someone once said, everything will be all right in the end. And if it’s not all right, then trust me, it’s not yet the end. —The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel  Never lose…

The Road to Morocco

My move to Morocco morphed from surreal to solid a couple of weeks ago when a plane ticket to Casablanca arrived. On August 18th I leave Nashville for New York, then Africa. When I land on August 19th the school’s driver will take me from the airport to my new home, an apartment in the Gueliz suburb of Marrakech. Much has happened since January…

Seismic Shifts: Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica to Marrakech, Morocco

I called it my No Fear Tour. The plan was to travel solo to a jungle beach house in Costa Rica’s Caribbean to test the waters for an expat life. The trip rocked my world–literally.

Past, Present, Future Dickens of a Christmas

I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. –A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving, made a US federal holiday by Abraham Lincoln in the midst of the Civil War, is still a day set aside to stop the striving, shopping, doing (unless volunteering to feed the hungry and shelter the cold) in order to JUST BE…with family, with friends, with our Creator from whom all blessings flow.  The older I get the more I am determined to…

Fall Weather Back Home

This week in Nashville we had our first snow flurries.  It was even colder than a month ago when I stepped off the plane in The Netherlands to a twenty degree temperature drop. On my fall break trip to Europe I was forced for the first time since May to exchange flip flops for close-toed shoes. I also broke out the scarves, a fleece…