Rain like Mercy Fall Down on Me
I live in the Midwest, in Chicago where this year we have been experiencing a drought. Not sure, but it seems like we haven’t had significant rain since the beginning of May. After the record-setting heat wave last week the grass in the park is like straw. The trees look like October, turning brown and losing their leaves. The peach farmer I work for at the Green City Market (link) is beside herself. There is real fear about losing the crop entirely. This fear is compounded by the fact that they are already down in their harvest by over 40% because of the early warm spring and then late frosts. Lately I’ve also been in a drought. Burned out. Maybe it was the two-week artist residency where I pushed out a revision on a 45,000-word YA novel. The intricacy of re-visioning, going over and over again the same material, sometimes rearranging, sharpening scenes, writing new material, and, at the same time, asking myself questions, pretending I was a reader approaching the boo...