Rica Keenum's Blog, page 5

Here Comes the Rain!

Petals of Rain is here!!! I’m not a fan of excessive punctuation, but this news calls for at least a few exclamation points. My memoir is finished, finalized, ready for its debut release in February 2020. That’s both terrifying and exhilarating. It’s not easy putting your art in the world, and it’s harder still to …

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How Baking and Writing Became Band-Aids

I used to bake. Post-divorce, I had a new life to navigate and it felt good to steady my hands with a spoon, with bowls of sugar and flour. Serving cake to my boys in our broken home felt maternal, like an offering. Could baked goods bandage wounds? I wrote about those years and the …

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Too Young For Boys

When I was growing up, my sister had a boy crush whose family was troubled. Their situation ended badly and the story still haunts me. We hear news every day but this was the first time a headline broke through my bubble. I understood that tragedy is not elusive. Suicide, murder, heartbreak, loss — these …

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Something Darker

Every so often it’s necessary to put on something sexier than usual — a pair of heels that pinch your toes but transform your legs into dangerous weapons. But this post is not about fashion. It’s actually about writing. Over the past decade or so, I’ve written a lot of yoga-themed, inspirational stuff. I even …

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A Tribute to Grandma

I woke up around 4 a.m., frazzled and feeling the darkness like a strange web. I dreamed of her— her lips were glossy and red as always and I thought how they looked like the candy apples a coworker just made for Halloween. For a few moments, I thought she was still with us. I’d …

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Remember This Truth About Beauty

As a journalist, I spent the last few weeks interviewing women who lost their hair and their breasts as they fought for their lives, battling the beast that attacks 1 in 8 women in America — breast cancer.  We shed tears. “I woke up healthy one day and went to bed terminally ill,” one woman said. …

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Writing Memoir: How I Took the Leap

It started with a collection of essays that led me down the dusty roads of my past, barefooted so I could feel my feet sink into the memories. I wanted to write about the good times — trips to the park with my sons when the cool air made ghosts of our breath. I wanted …

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This is How We Feel The Road

It is a warm afternoon, a lazy Saturday in which we attempt to see the world beyond reruns of Fast and Loud, or my choice: Fixer Upper. These shows always leave us wanting things we do not really need — more horsepower, more square footage. But we have enough and the forecast looks good, so …

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Motherhood Means Letting Go- But We Can Choose To Go Slow

I am a twenty-something mother of two when my oldest son starts school. He meanders onto the playground and into the whirling sea of child-monsters who are howling and flailing on the concrete in front of the building. I am air-starved, despite the cool breeze that is playing inside our shirts as if we are …

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Get Over Yourself, Writer

When the words begin to bubble and brew in my soul, building up with volcanic force, writing sets them free. The expression of my art keeps me alive in a way that nothing else can. So to write is not merely a privilege — it is a necessity. But it ain’t easy. Hell no, it …

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