…at play in the field of words…
What I like best about working with words is that it combines passion and play.
Falling in love with an idea or an image or a story, envisioning a book from a mass of raw material, experimenting with how to arrange it, condensing some parts and expanding others—all that can be done in a spirit of play. Passion enables you to stay with it through doubt and difficulty, trusting that it will all be worth it to reach those moments of feeling, Yes, this is it—that sense of rightness when the words produce the effect you aim for.
After polishing text and trying out titles and seemingly endless refinements, you may discover that the words have led you beyond the original impetus to something entirely unexpected. For me that process happens, to some degree, with both writing and editing and with a wide variety of texts.
Writing
My book on spiritual friendship, Hello At Last: Embracing the Koan of Friendship & Meditation, was published in late 2007 by Windhorse Publications. My first book, This Side of Nirvana, will be reissued in the fall of 2008. Both books are described on the Writing page, along with excerpts and links to articles I’ve written.
Editing
Assisting writers in bringing texts to their full potential is a gratifying and joyful process. As an editor I work mainly with scholarly materials in arts and humanities—with some notable exceptions. William Everett, author of Red Clay, Blood River, asked me to assist on one aspect of his eco-historical saga linking three continents, many generations, and a profound earth-centered vision. Although I am not a fiction editor, I was won over by the opportunity to contribute to this extraordinary novel.
Publishing
Producing books is one of the best ways I know to have fun. (Selling them is another story.) Present Perfect Books is no longer in business, but the seven titles published on Buddhist meditation practice are still available and are listed on this page.
I live on the edge of the Great Smoky Mountains of western North Carolina, where I’m writing a book on disenchantment and indulging in my current enthusiasms, Slow Food and Small Houses.
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