The cover of Time Magazine with its horrific black-and-white image of a sinking ship and billowing smoke, anchored me to the spot. I snatched it from the rack, the last issue available: PEARL HARBOR – 75 YEARS LATER.

I just read that human beings are hard-wired to play hooky. Man, I feel so much better about myself now. Don’t get me wrong, I am one hard-working person, but there are times when I’m fed up with my own expectations.

My dear friend Marni lost her big brother to brain cancer this week. In my experience, there is nothing as devastating than watching someone you love crumble under the weight of loss. The ripple effect of his death sent shockwaves through me, and I shuddered at each successive text from Marni.

I grew up bouncing between our home in the San Francisco Bay Area and our ranch in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Ever since, I have loved the contrast of these places – the energy of the city with its theater, music and art and the silence and beauty of the mountains.

My life is loaded with events that shake me to the core. Sometimes when deciding on one to write about, my topic is so deeply personal, I wonder, What am I thinking? I can’t speak about this!

Exposing the truth is an ongoing battle raging in my gut, every single day. But I know that if I can somehow manage to get it down on paper, something will shift inside me. There is power in words arranged in just the right order, that help us heal. They comfort and underscore our fragile hold on existence, reminding us that life can change in an instant.

John Muir said, “The mountains are calling and I must go.” Amen, brother. It’s high time I hit the trail. For me, that means returning to the Sierra Nevada Mountains. We have a long history together, the mountains and I, as gnarled and magnificent as a Bristlecone Pine. The Sierra’s pull is so strong that sometimes as I sit down to write, memories flood through me and I have to sit down.

Unlike corporate coffee houses with their gleaming stainless and fishbowl walls of glass, my preferred writing place is dark and womb-like, a funky artistic hangout with arteries of extension cords snaking across the wood floors – lifelines for writers. I always bring my headphones when I go there because music makes all the difference.

It’s like so much magic, really, when the perfect article appears just when you need it and saves you from yourself. It was 4 a.m., and I had just clicked on my daily email from Brevity.com, a wonderful source of inspiration for authors. The featured article vibrated like neon on the page. “Why I’m Giving Up on Being Published,” by Woz Flint. I was hooked.

I inherited Mom’s poker face – that calm-in-the-storm mask that has served me well throughout my life. It’s foolproof except for the tiny twitch in the corner of my left cheek, evidence that inside my head, I’m a screaming jungle of emotions, a dark mass of self doubt entwined with the past.

Outside it’s a Portland drizzle, the perfect excuse for staying in my pajamas and working on a scene in my book. Today I’m working on the one in which Dad is gesticulating in the kitchen, informing my sister and me that a thief broke into our home while we were at school, leaving us “something very interesting, indeed.”