Found a cool rock on a walk at my parents’ place. I’m cleaning it, admiring the colors. It has some iron inclusions, maybe some moss stains. I don’t know; I’m not a geologist or even a rockhound. But I found a cool rock, and I’m cleaning it. And I’m thinking of tending to my own life, clearing off what doesn’t belong or is no longer needed, and preparing for what comes next.
Dawn Shepherd is a writer, a professor emeritus of writing studies, and an enthusiastic amateur of many things. After stepping away from higher education in 2025 to pursue a cross-country van journey and travels through Spain, she is currently exploring the art of the deliberate return. Through dispatches, sketches, and snapshots, she documents the magic of everyday life. She lives in Greensboro, North Carolina, where she’s figuring it all out. Probably. Maybe.
