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Crescent Dragonwagon

FIFTY SHADES OF GRIEF, IN OCTOBER

FIFTY SHADES OF GRIEF, IN OCTOBER

By Crescent Dragonwagon 12 Comments

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WIDOWHOOD IS NOT STATIC. IT KEEPS CHANGING, AND IT KEEPS CHANGING US. IT HAS AN INFINITE NUMBER OF COLORS. HERE ARE FIFTY OF THEM. 1. I take a lot of deep breaths this time of year. 2. It’s fall, the season inherently bittersweet and elegiac. All that plush color and harvest, all that stunning beauty, some years almost ostentatiously spectacular…. Read More

Filed Under: #WidowhoodWednesday, Crescent Dragonwagon, Fearless Living Tagged With: Adam Gopnik, aging parents, cremation, dia de las muertas, does everything happen for a reason, fifty shades, Halloween, hanging, mortality, suicide, suicide survivors, suicide widow, triggers, widowhood, Widowhood Wednesday

THE REINVENTION OF A DAY: HOW WE’RE CALLED (& WHO WE CALL) WHEN THINGS DO NOT GO ACCORDING TO PLAN

THE REINVENTION OF A DAY: HOW WE’RE CALLED (& WHO WE CALL) WHEN THINGS DO NOT GO ACCORDING TO PLAN

By Crescent Dragonwagon 6 Comments

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Last Friday, I finally made it to my doctor’s office for a full physical. I had tried, sincerely, a few weeks earlier, on a hot, hot humid day. But only partially succeeded. A tree got in the way. But in a larger sense, perhaps, a tree was the way. Disruption. What a weird gift it is. *** If a tree… Read More

Filed Under: Fearless Living Tagged With: aging parents, change of plans, Crescent dragonwagon, happiness increases with age, reinvention

THE DILL-SEEKERS: AN HERB, A MOTHER, MEMORY

THE DILL-SEEKERS: AN HERB, A MOTHER, MEMORY

By Crescent Dragonwagon 12 Comments

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I’d had friends over last Friday, for dinner. A couple of the dishes I’d served them required a little fresh dill. Now, you can’t buy a little dill. You buy it by the bunch. That bunch is usually, especially this time of year, preposterously large. This is problematical. I live alone, except for when my boyfriend comes up from New York to spend a few… Read More

Filed Under: #DinnerwithDragonwagon Tagged With: aging, aging parents, Charlotte Zolotow, cooking, Crescent dragonwagon, culinary writing, dill, Food and Drink, herbs, mothers and daughters, vinaigrette

A FOXGLOVE FLOWER FALLING REMINDS ME OF CHARLOTTE, AND WHY

A FOXGLOVE FLOWER FALLING REMINDS ME OF CHARLOTTE, AND WHY

By Crescent Dragonwagon 4 Comments

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It’s the softest sound in the world, and one only occasionally hears it: a flower falling. This morning, sitting in the right place, I heard it. A single foxglove blossom dropped from the arrangement I had placed on a table yesterday.   It’s such a small sound, but it stayed with me all day. Until I finally asked myself, ” Why?”… Read More

Filed Under: Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized Tagged With: aging parents, Charlotte Zolotow, children's book writing, Crescent dragonwagon, flower falling, If You Listen, mothers and daughters

My father, the stripper’s press agent

By Crescent Dragonwagon 1 Comment

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After the Los Angeles funeral of my late father, Maurice Zolotow, a well-dressed, chic, trim woman came up to me and extended her hand. She had excellent posture, and her hair — a jet-black that looked neither harsh nor unnatural — was well-styled in a short, flattering, expensive cut. Her age was hard to guess (I figured out later that… Read More

Filed Under: Books, Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent Dragonwagon, Maurice Zolotow, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: aging, aging parents, celebrity biography, change, fame, grief & grieving, mothers, narrative, sexuality, writer's memory, writers, writing

Keeping the “dead” in “deadline”

By Crescent Dragonwagon 2 Comments

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“He cannot be dead,” said Paul, my father’s editor at Playboy. “It is Friday. I am sitting here looking at a pitch letter he sent me on Monday.” Things you don’t realize will be part of your job description: returning voicemail messages left for your father, who has suddenly died. “Well, Paul,” I said, “Maurice always said he wanted to… Read More

Filed Under: Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: aging, aging parents, appreciation, death, grief & grieving, Ned Shank, resilience, Wislawa Syzmborska, writer's memory, writers, writing

elegy for a tomatillo … and Steve Jobs

By Crescent Dragonwagon 6 Comments

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We planned to go for a walk at twilight tonight, David and I, but when we stepped outside the dusk was chillier than we'd anticipated. "I wonder if I should go check the forecast," he said. "Yeah, you should," I said, "because if it's going to get below freezing we probably need to do some harvesting." He went back inside,… Read More

Filed Under: Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: aging parents, beans, blossoms, canning & preserving, compassion towards self and others, Crescent dragonwagon, death, first frost, gardening, gradual transformation, grief, grief & grieving, health, hope, love, narrative, natural world, Ned Shank, potentiality, preserving, resilience, salsa verde, Steve Jobs, story, tomatillos, Vermont, writing

Aunt Dot & the Splendid Sunflowers

By Crescent Dragonwagon 19 Comments

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When I came to 410 East 57th Street that night, it was already dark, but not late. Early winter, then, it must have been, maybe about 7:30 or 8:00. A Sunday evening.  Aunt Dot, then 95 or 96, was seated facing into the living room, in one of the two 50’s-era Danish modern recliner chairs (blonde wood, cushions covered in… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: aging, aging parents, appreciation, change, death, eldercare, gardening, grief & grieving, home, hope, hospice, letting go, love, natural world, saying goodbye, sunflowers, Vermont

a sound of wings unseen, inadvertent wisdom: a fathering day post

By Crescent Dragonwagon 7 Comments

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Walking yesterday, up near Frazier's sugar shack here in Vermont, I heard an animal rustle in the underbrush edging the woods by the gravel road. Though I stood stock-still and watched, I couldn't see what it was. Too large for a chipmunk or a squirrel, smaller by far than a deer, I was left only with the sudden sound of… Read More

Filed Under: Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent Dragonwagon, Maurice Zolotow Tagged With: Aekansas, aging, aging parents, Ann-Margret, appreciation, Arkansas, Audobon Society, birds, Brigitte Bardot, celebrity biography, change, Charlotte Zolotow, Count Basie, Crescent dragonwagon, death, Duke Ellington, environmentalism, Eureka Springs, fame, Father's Day, Film, friendship, great blue heron, great blue heron, Heraclitus, Hollywood, hope, John Wayne, John Wayne, King's River, Los Angeles, love, Marilyn Monroe, Maurice Zolotow, natural world, nature, peace, spruce grouse, Tallulah Bankhead, Ursula Anndress, Vermont, walking, walking, walks, wildlife. writing, writer's memory, writers, writing

the deer’s ears: Mose, me, misery & moments

By Crescent Dragonwagon 2 Comments

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Today, coming down to the hill towards the pond, beginning my morning walk, two animals — one large, one small — standing in the middle of the gravel road. I caught my breath, stood stock-still, blinked and waited, blinking a few times to clear my not-so-good vision so I could identify them. Ah. A white-tailed deer, and – what was… Read More

Filed Under: Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent Dragonwagon Tagged With: aging, aging parents, appreciation, Arkansas, Bounding, cat, cats, change, Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent dragonwagon, David Koff, death, deer, eldercare, eldercare, environmentalism, Eureka Springs, ferns, grief & grieving, home, love, Mose Allison, Mose Allison, mother, mothers, natural balance, natural predators, natural world, photography, poetry, Traca Savadago, Vermont, walking, walking, walks, woods, writer, writers, writing, writing

Redecoration, Part One: Aunt Dot contemplates the living room of the future

By Crescent Dragonwagon 6 Comments

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“I suppose you’ll live here one day?” Aunt Dot said. A statement; a question. She gave a quick, birdlike glance at me, then looked away. Waiting, I naturally assumed, for an answer. But how could I answer when I wasn’t sure what the question was? She was sitting, that night, on the wooden chair with the woven seat, near the… Read More

Filed Under: Books, Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent Dragonwagon, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: aging, aging parents, appreciation, Arkansas, aunt, cats, change, Charlotte Zolotow, compassion towards self and others, Crescent dragonwagon, death, eldercare, Eureka Springs, Eureka Springs, families, farm, gradual transformation, grief & grieving, home, love, natural world, Ned Shank, redecorating, Strong on Music, Vermont, Vermont, Vermont Country Store, wallpaper, writing

several big “O”s (including, but not limited to, October and Obama)

By Crescent Dragonwagon 11 Comments

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It is the best of times; it is the worst of times. It is October in Vermont. It is an election year (and what an election). It is the month of the year that was Ned’s last full month on earth. The best: the transition of the leaves from verdant to plush flame, fuchsia, gold, ochre, orange, salmon, a hundred… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: aging, aging parents, compassion towards self and others, David Koff, death, eldercare, gradual transformation, grief & grieving, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, love, natural world, Ned Shank, oyster mushrooms, puffballs, poetry, sexuality, Vermont, writing, Yeats

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Tuesdays with Crescent Spring 2019

Tuesdays with Crescent Spring 2019

January Class Series

January Class Series

Works In Progress Spring 2019

Works In Progress Spring 2019

#DeepFeast Recipes

A  LENTIL SOUP SO “RICH, FRAGRANT, SATISFYING” THAT SOMEONE ATE IT DAILY – HAPPILY! – FOR 15 YEARS
PUCKER UP, BUTTERNUT: SOULFUL WINTER SQUASH SOUP WITH GINGER-APPLE SALSA
TOMATO MEDITATION, AT SUMMER’S END
COOL HAND CUKE: CUCUMBER-YOGURT SOUP WITH MINT, & GRAPES,  WITH A VEGAN VARIATION.
I FEED THIS GUINNESS STOUT CHOCOLATE LAYER CAKE TO MY FATHER ONLY IN MY DREAMS
STILL BEANING AFTER ALL THESE YEARS
A TIMELESS BLUEBERRY COFFEE CAKE, RIGHT NOW. AND, INTRODUCING MONK-FRUIT, BEST-EVER ALTERNATIVE TO SUGAR.
YET ANOTHER  SECRET REVEALED IN MY FAMOUS “RAISIN-PUMPERNICKEL BREAD WITH A SECRET”

More Posts from this Category

Dinner with Dragonwagon

PUCKER UP, BUTTERNUT: SOULFUL WINTER SQUASH SOUP WITH GINGER-APPLE SALSA
COOL HAND CUKE: CUCUMBER-YOGURT SOUP WITH MINT, & GRAPES,  WITH A VEGAN VARIATION.
I FEED THIS GUINNESS STOUT CHOCOLATE LAYER CAKE TO MY FATHER ONLY IN MY DREAMS
STILL BEANING AFTER ALL THESE YEARS

More Posts from this Category

Rouses Markets Features Crescent’s Ultimate Veggie Burger

Rouses Markets Features Crescent’s Ultimate Veggie Burger

Works In Progress Spring 2019 Group

Works In Progress Spring 2019 Group

 for children:

A NAPPA Gold Winner
NAPPA


"... like a warm luminescent blanket at bedtime... softly lulling." -- New York Times


"(With) weary animals, Dragonwagon offers an “alphabet of ways to sleep,” smoothly working in some alliteration..."
- Publishers Weekly (starred review)


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Until Just Moistened

Until Just Moistened

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