Author Archives: John Swinburn

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about fantasy. As I sit here this morning, drinking my rapidly-cooling coffee, the topic remains on my mind, if in a slightly different context. I think, perhaps, I should have pursued a career … Continue reading →

I may risk electrocution later this morning. I’ve had a ceiling fan speed control switch sitting on my desk for months, its installation waiting for my rage to subside from the last time I installed one just like it for … Continue reading →

Bloody raccoons! I woke much later than usual this morning, around 6, and wandered out of the bedroom without even putting on my “morning clothes.” As I exited the bedroom into the living area, and before even reaching for the … Continue reading →

The scream of the NOAA Weather Radio, alerting me to a tropical storm warning for Hot Springs Village, awakened me completely at 3:31 a.m. Only moments earlier, vague noises emanating from my Echo Dot in the next room prodded me … Continue reading →

I altered my routine this morning, but only slightly. I read and responded to an email, explored the extent to which counterfeit scallops are made by punching circular “cookie cutters” through skate wings—there’s ample suggestions that it is done, but … Continue reading →

At some point, the stress becomes noticeable; not so much to others, but to oneself. Enthusiasm ebbs, leaving in its place flashes of dysphoria. A harsh, dry cloud of discontent settles over one’s thoughts like volcanic ash, sucking oxygen out … Continue reading →

My thoughts, some days, are so jumbled and scattered and frazzled that I cannot begin to capture them in language. I try and try and try and come up empty. Nine or ten incoherent paragraphs in, I finally give in … Continue reading →

I call it Swinburn’s Theory of Beguiling Embrace.  For the sake of my fingers and to  briefly conserve the alphabet, I’ll call it STBE. It explains the magnetic attraction many people find in church participation. And STBE reveals the allure … Continue reading →

Why, I wonder, have architects avoided designing steeples into residential construction? Or have they? Perhaps I am simply unfamiliar with a school of residential architecture in which steeples play a prominent part. But if steeples have not found their way … Continue reading →

In the face of challenging ideas and information, one’s mind should stretch like a ball of freshly-minted rubber bands. But whether one’s mind should expand in the presence of such experiences or not, too frequently the response is the opposite. … Continue reading →

Does everyone fantasize? I have asked that question for a very long time; simply because the topic interests me. The question is not limited to sexual fantasies, either. I wonder whether people fantasize about houses they might like to build … Continue reading →

Our paths follow an elliptical orbit around secrets we simply cannot unlock, secrets hidden not through willful disguise but by natural obscurity, the same way some sounds are withheld from our ears but given freely to the ears of dogs, … Continue reading →

Whatever it was—stomach bug, psychosomatic illness, food poisoning, malaria—seems to have largely disappeared. I would give my sensation of health a solid 80 on a scale of zero to one hundred. Yesterday, it was closer to 50. Thirty points makes … Continue reading →

Fragments of complex, semi-conscious dreams populate my memory of last night in bed, suggesting I did get some sleep. In spite of those muddy, incomplete recollections, I do not feel like I slept at all. I was conscious when sunlight … Continue reading →

The explosive crash of thunder this morning—the one that felt like a huge light bulb exploded inches from my face—struck someplace close enough to fry my 55-inch Samsung TV. And all the land-line phones, both corded base and cordless sets, … Continue reading →

Weeks and weeks ago (maybe months ago) I bought a large bag of new potatoes. The bag was marketed as “crawfish boil potatoes” or something like that.  With the exception of one or two potatoes snatched out of the bag … Continue reading →

The weather prognosticators say the high temperature today will reach ninety degrees. That means the air will warm twenty-two fahrenheits beyond its current level, a cool sixty-eight (which does not feel awfully cool, thanks to the beastly humidity). An acquaintance, … Continue reading →

I want to withdraw completely into myself, to retreat into an impenetrable shell that blocks sounds and sights and sensations and emotions. A protective cocoon, a place in another dimension far removed from the one in which we live, might … Continue reading →

When I awoke this morning, around ten after four, somber nonsense lyrics and a simple, repetitive tune spun through my head. I sang these words out loud: Garfunkel Smithers was a very bad man, ice water flowed through his veins. … Continue reading →