Erik Raschke

Middle

2011-08-23T11:48:00.001-07:00

I'm in the middle of every project now.

Under

2011-07-30T11:53:00.000-07:00

We swim now, as the days become warmer. We swim and swim and hold our eyes open for a fraction of a second before we kick to the surface and emerge just in time.

Chaco Canyon

2011-06-15T03:32:00.000-07:00

Chaco Canyon was once thriving. Hundreds of people lived in these pueblos, eating, drinking, dancing...

Just after my parents divorce, my mother took me to Chaco Canyon. While I explored the ruins, she laid in the sun. I could hear the voices, smell the fires, see the bustle while my mother said, with each passing day, her own worries were evaporating.

A House

2011-04-18T01:09:00.000-07:00

When I am alone in my house, it feels as if I am the only one has ever lived here. The walls are mine, the windows are mine, the floor is mine and, at the same time, they also belong to someone else's memory.

Immigrants

2010-11-25T01:30:00.000-08:00

Early one morning, I walked by this church, de Oude Kerk, and as I stopped for coffee, I watched a group of Peruvians with mops and buckets by their feet, sharing a box of croissants. Soon five Bulgarian women passed and stepped inside their respective, red-lit rooms, newly cleaned by the Peruvians. The Bulgarian women pulled the curtains shut most likely stripping down to their work lingerie. A light rain began to fall and instead of disbanding, the Peruvians huddled ever closer.

Sunday Morning

2010-11-17T23:57:00.000-08:00

Sunday mornings are no longer reserved for myself. Now, I provide the instruction, the conscience, the boundaries for my small congregation.

Ghost Town

2010-11-03T02:46:00.001-07:00

Will we remember this moment or will it dwell only within photos, a flash of equanimity burnished by time?

Lost

2010-11-01T13:34:00.000-07:00

In an blurry, early morning attempt to find my way back to my hotel room, I passed this face repeatedly...

Global Graffiti

2010-10-11T11:53:00.000-07:00

The first forty pages of my next (or third) novel....

Yellow

2010-09-14T01:09:00.000-07:00

His eyes are from me, yet his view will always be different, enlightening.

Sultan

2010-09-13T12:35:00.000-07:00

My son and I went on a Sultan's yacht. The Sultan, who was not on the yacht, is a Sultan of one of the smallest countries in the Middle East. We met the Sultan's crew (above) and my son got a bronze medal or something which he lost twenty minutes later while diving into on a big pool of plastic balls on Pirate Island.

Bird

2010-05-13T07:39:00.001-07:00

There's a bird who's been sitting on the roof of our building and singing out to all of Amsterdam. He starts about 6 a.m. and goes until about noon. Then he takes a break until four and sings until eight. I can hear him even when I'm blocks away.

2010-04-13T12:22:00.000-07:00

Those older than me are so calm. All the choices have been made. The results are apparent. There is nothing left to do. I am still in the middle of my choices. What a frustrating place to be and yet how remarkable that I can still influence the outcome.

The View from My Writing Desk

2010-04-04T10:51:00.000-07:00

The silence is congenial. The view is taciturn. Here my day-dreams can become literary.

Records

2010-03-19T06:36:00.000-07:00

I've been listening to my mother's records which have been packed away for the last two years. Whether washing the dishes or gardening, my mother was always listening to music, always singing along to the same lyrics. Today, I was listening to John Wesley Harding and when it came to "I'll be your baby tonight" the dozens of scratches reminded me, in a melancholy way, that this had been one of my her favorite songs.

Part of Me

2010-03-12T00:03:00.000-08:00

Who is this little man who is me and not me? What parts of me will he take and will he reject? And how will I remain a part of him once I am gone? His innocence is so fleeting. So much goes into such a little boy in such a short amount of time..

Seeing

2010-02-19T06:12:00.001-08:00

When I am alone in my writing space and my mind has the freedom to dream, it does not want to engage in literary exposition. It simply wants to dream. What does this mean my writing is if not dreaming? Is the creation of fiction something colder and less mystical than I've always believed?

The Tire in a Tree

2010-02-10T03:10:00.000-08:00

This tire hung above a brightly colored modern playground which itself was in the middle of a medieval square. Across the street from the playground was a store that sold Russian vodka and snacks. The man who owned the store had a fully furnished living room concealed behind a blue curtain. He told me some Arab boys had thrown the tire onto the lamp-post and then hung around afterward and smoked cigarettes. He told me that the tire had been there for almost six months and no one had taken it down. He, himself, was planning on returning to Moscow soon because, he explained, in Russia, unlike France, mischievous immigrants were almost always held accountable, in one way or another, for their actions.

water

2010-02-04T12:19:00.000-08:00

I am not where I thought I'd be in my life. But the twists and turns away from what I always imagined would be my life are not necessarily bad. In fact it could be argued that these diversions are better. Sometimes I wish I could silence my inner-critic and simply enjoy the moment.

Snow

2010-01-31T07:57:00.001-08:00

A snowy winter is much easier on my constitution than a rainy one.

Writing

2010-01-23T07:40:00.000-08:00

The bluster of our western world.... While intentions change and charge, while technology leads astray and asunder, while laws and lawmakers compensate and deprive, good fortune still lays upon the horizon of our imagination.

Ducks

2010-01-17T03:27:00.000-08:00

The canals and ponds in the north of the Netherlands were briefly filled with skaters and children on sleds. But it is only January and the rain has returned, melting the snow, cracking instead of replenishing the ice. However, today, I let my five-week old son's tiny face glory in the temporary sunlight while I watched ducks weave amongst the debris of their once fixed vicinage.

Germany

2010-01-12T12:02:00.000-08:00

On the day we saw this particular bridge, it was raining. My son and I were covered from head to toe in rain gear. He pointed at the water and smiled, then his smile faded, then pointed again and smiled. Raindrops bouncing on top of a swiftly moving river. Boiling. The strange details of this new world. How remarkable is that strangeness.

Photo Albums

2010-01-05T13:31:00.000-08:00

Tonight, two years after her death, I threw away my mother's photo albums. These were photos of her trips to China, Bali, Turkey, Europe. Since she hated having her photo taken, her albums were full of pictures of places where she had been, that meant something to her, that sparked her own memory. For me they were just landscapes, tourist attractions, people I'd never met. The albums were all labelled, chronologically ordered, and each picture set with a small strip of glue. I removed dozens of pictures of her, because those are what were important to me. And now the albums, tied and cinched in trash bags, with their new small white gaps inside, belong to something entirely different. They are a representation of my mother's memories which she took with her two years ago.

New Year

2010-01-01T01:29:00.000-08:00

Last night was a full moon and the beginning of a New Year. Last night, as with so many New Years Eve's before, I heard people chatting about the problems of last year, their hopes for a New Year, and how this particular night, with the champagne and fireworks, and the meaningful kisses, was a bridge into a better future.

Cluster

2009-12-28T10:40:00.000-08:00

In Kubla Khan, Coleridge writes about the wonderful silence of a sleeping house. Last night, while everyone was deep in their dreams, I sat on my couch, in the dim room, and stared at the lights of my Christmas tree. Vanished into the dark were the bulbs and ornaments. I was left with hundreds of little white lights, which were varied and repetitive, which, excuse the poor metaphor, was the same as my thoughts and concerns.

Afterward I went out on my balcony. It was well below zero and the sky was transparent, the omnipotent Dutch mist and vapor frozen back to earth. Above the stars spread out under the pink glow of Amsterdam. I went to bed strangely content.

Bamberg

2009-12-27T10:32:00.000-08:00

The memories I have of Bamberg are not of the structures built by medieval architects, but of my own troubled state of mind. Is it fair to rank my personal concerns against these historic relics?

The water here was so clear, the sky so murky, and the many troops, stuck somewhere between their home in America and the Iraqi land that changed them forever, wandering aimlessly, so confused. I was only in Bamberg for one day, but it it was obvious that the term "at a crossroad" does not only apply to an individual, but to a time period as well.

Beautiful

2009-12-23T10:50:00.000-08:00

Each day he becomes stronger and less dependent. Soon, my beautiful second son will be taller, stronger, more adept at the world than me. Eventually he will look on me as I look on him, as a child, and he will speak to me as I speak to him, slowly, reassuringly, his confidence swirled in his head by my layers of need.

My son, my executioner

2009-12-22T11:25:00.000-08:00

My son, my executioner
I take you in my arms
Quiet and small and just astir
and whom my body warms

Sweet death, small son,
our instrument of immortality,
your cries and hunger document
our bodily decay.

We twenty two and twenty five,
who seemed to live forever,
observe enduring life in you
and start to die together.

~~~Donald Hall

Monochromatism

2009-12-12T08:07:00.000-08:00

Winter darkness makes me crave light. The exposed trees. The gray skies. And it's not just the warm aqua light of a Caribbean island that I yearn for, but any rich color that affects me emotionally, any form of light that wards off the monochromatism.

Painting

2009-12-08T13:46:00.000-08:00

This is why the Dutch have such a rich history of painting and light and color. Taken on the beach near Den Bergen just north of Amsterdam from my I-phone.

Page 139

2009-12-02T02:52:00.000-08:00

This photo nicely compliments page 139 of my novel, The Book of Samuel.

Zwarte Pete

2009-11-30T05:30:00.000-08:00

Yes, it is time again in the Netherlands for Santa's blackfaced helpers. I am always somewhat unnerved by their presence (they are one of the few things that make my son cry), but I am never sure if my feelings arise out some sort of forced political correctness or another, more innate angst.

Bush

2009-11-26T11:21:00.000-08:00

To breath among the red trees and walk a well-tended path, but be numbed by a clumsy wind. To be an American overseas on Thanksgiving... when thousands of miles away the dishes are clanging and the smells are familiar. The longing is brittle, the nostalgia suspiciously sincere. But who would I sit there with other than my family who happens to be here?

Good Citizen

2009-11-22T05:44:00.000-08:00

I was surprised when I won a "Good Citizen" award back in 8th grade. I think they just ran out of kids to give it to and I was in the middle somewhere. Because while I was not necessarily a good student, I wasn't a bad one either. I was just there.

6th Grade Class

2009-11-19T22:28:00.000-08:00

This is my sixth grade homeroom class. My mother deeply believed in bussing so I was bussed for forty-five minutes, each way, to five-points in Denver, to a predominantly African-American school. However, after homeroom, all students were sent to their respective math and English classes. I joined fellow students who had similar State test scores. These classes were almost entirely white.

Creation

2009-11-19T12:33:00.000-08:00

While I have been working most of my life to create a novel like The Book of Samuel, I have spent the last three years with my all-time favorite creation. There's no other way I would want to open my inaugural blog post...