Jodi Hills

So this is who I am – a writer that paints, a painter that writes…

Monthly Archives: October 2025


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One Terry.

It wasn’t long after I realized that everyone didn’t have them, these Tech-ers in the basement, that they were gone. It’s clear now that we needed the money more than the space. We went through at least three cycles of young men from the law enforcement class. I only remember one’s name – Terry Eilers. Maybe because he was also our bus driver, but mostly I think because he was nice to me. And wasn’t that everything? —when there was just one unlocked door at the bottom of the stairs that separated them from our laundry. 

Before lessons were learned, I race from upstairs to downstairs without a glance. It was one of the men from the first group of three. (Everyone over 17 seems like a man when you are six.) He was building a canoe in the driveway to our basement. Fascinated by anything being built, I was probably annoying. Watchful. Eager to know the bend of wood. And what was that green stuff? What was he putting on the shell? Certainly he must have my best interests at heart, I thought, he lived with us after all.  He was going to enforce the law. He told me to touch the canoe. I poked one hesitant finger out of my sleeve and touched it as if it were a hot pan on the stove. No, really get in there, he said. Rub your arm across it. I don’t why I did. Just like the heat from a hot pan, it took a minute for the tiny shards of glass, the insulation, to reach my brain. And it took longer, I suppose, wondering not why the pain, but more, why did he want to inflict it? 

I wasn’t going to let him see me cry. I ran up the browning hill of fall grass. Through the garage door. Down the stairs to the laundry room in the basement. Took off the painful sweater and placed it in a basket. It was the first time I noticed there was no lock on that door. It was the first time I needed one. 

I stayed upstairs for the rest of their time. The next group came. They called one “Buzz” I think because of his hair, but I remained at a distance. 

When Terry Eilers came the next year, slightly overweight in his tan shirt and brown pants, the new uniform of the students, he smiled at me from behind the big bus wheel. I don’t know how many rides it took before I trusted him, but I did.

It’s no longer a technical school, but a college. They have their own housing now, I guess. Call it whatever you want, I hope we’ve all learned along the way. Kindness is memorable. 

Some will try to take it away. Innocence. Curiosity. Joy. Others still will pick you up when you need it most. It only takes one Terry.

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First I was a cowboy.

It’s one of my favorites in Paris, the Musée d’Orsay. Maybe because it feels most like me. 

It didn’t start out as a museum. At one point it was a train station, 

even a parking lot, long before it housed the most beautiful impressionists in the world. I suppose I’ve always known it — that I would have to become, and keep becoming.

When I was a kid, I thought I would just figure stuff out, you know, and be something, and that would be it…that would be my life. Because didn’t they always ask, “What are you going to be?” And especially at this time of year, as we prepared to dress up and go from door to door asking for our treat behind the question, “What are you supposed to be?” 

At first I was a cowboy, (was this my train station?). Then I was a hobo, (my parking lot?) It took a long time to become an artist. This was me. Who I was supposed to be. 

I think that I, we, just have to keep becoming. We change and grow. We are molded by love and trips around the sun. It takes a long time to build a soul. We get older, maybe wiser, (even better, we gain a little grace) but we don’t finish – we don’t have to – we begin, and be, and begin again. I think that’s the gift of living…the joy of being alive!

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Amid the tatters.

Before Google, my mother had recipe cards with chocolate stains and bits of dough. A Betty Crocker cookbook so tattered, pages dogeared more with hope than actual meals made. She had a Bible with verses underlined in tears and yellow highlighter. Quotes from books stuck to the phone to remind her of what was actually funny now. Cassette tapes cued to the kitchen dance. And a phone book nearly rewritten with vital numbers like the Clinque counter at Macy’s. 

And it was tangible, this chain of life. How it moved from heart to page to note to smile. I suppose it is what I’m still trying to do. To create the images. Meld them with thought. (Neither artificial.) So you can touch and feel, and pass them on, with your own notes and heart and smiles. And amid all the tatters and laughter, what we will have is real. So very real. 

Love tangible.

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Love’s bright spot.

It always comes as a surprise — the morning dark. It is delightful though, that I still believe summer will never end. That the morning light will sprinkle me awake and pull me into the promise of ever. And I make those same promises back. I always have.

From the moment I stepped off the last school bus ride of the year. I’d drop what was left of the documentation of another year at Washington Elementary, and I’d pull off my bumper tennis shoes without taking the time to untie, and I’d wiggle my feet in the yet unmown grass, and to each blade of green that snuck through the spaces of winter toes, I would promise to enjoy every moment of sun lit wonder.

And oh, how I filled my pockets with light. Wagons pulled. Balls hit. Bikes ridden. Each one a bright spot to carry me through the winter I would never see coming.

I suppose it’s the same with love. All that light and promise. Even in the darkness, it never goes away. It wiggles through toes and dances in hearts, and keeps its promises. Ever.

I smile at the morning dark. I am not afraid. Everything is still possible. And I am surely loved.

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Tugged.

We could have been aproned from her apron, but still we dove right in. I imagine the brunt of what she wiped from bowl to hand to apron ended up on the front of my shirt and the side of my face. This tug to be near defied all things sticky. I just wanted to be a part of it. Of what she was doing. Baking. Creating. Becoming. And she allowed it, because wouldn’t it all get washed, not in the laundry, but in my attempt to help with the dishes. 

With the scent wafting through the oven’s heat, she filled the double sink. Extra bubbles. She asked if I wanted a stool. I shook my head no. The cupboard below was already scuffed from my tennis shoes as I placed my hands on the side of the cupboard and hoisted myself up on the edge of the sink. Belly balanced. Feet dangling. Completely wet. I danced my hands through the water. A temperature far less than what she could handle, I crawl stroked my way through the pile. Did she rewash them? I don’t think so, at least never in front of me. 

When I could no longer breathe from the weight of balancing, I jumped down. Wiped my hands, my face, my neck and belly, all on her apron. And we were connected. A tug that still calls to me. 

When I need the strength of “it’s good enough for joy,” I wrap myself in my Minnesota apron, bake the bread and wash the dishes in a temperature I never imagined I could handle, and I am home. 


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As certain as limb.

When I didn’t recognize a word in my grandma’s kitchen it was usually because it was either a bad word, or something in Swedish, or on occasion, both. And so I thought it was with “fig.” What I had learned so far was that it flew, and we didn’t have any to give. 

We are surrounded by fig trees now. As plentiful as the apple trees on my grandparents’ farm. And as certain as the limb is to the bird, I know some things for sure. 

With time, the things that make me care seem to change. Tears and laughter often reverse their roles. The world switches from big to small depending on the uncertainties that surround us, while comfort packs its bags and moves from place to place, never leaving a forwarding address. But though the impermanence of people and feelings, you stay as slow, as warm and as forever as children’s summer laughter. You remain a part of my heart’s truth, the part that doesn’t get crushed beneath the weight of time passing, the part I give thanks for, every day.

I land on morning’s limb, everything to give. 

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The light between rooms.

I’ve yet to capture it on film. (But certainly in the shutter of my heart.) Some call it golden hour. And I suppose, as glorious as it is, it’s not that uncommon, but in this house I live, at this one certain time, I have witnessed this light between rooms, not only shine and illuminate, but bend. 

It’s just a small window in the sewing room, Grandma Elsie’s sewing room, but when the hour is golden, the light thrusts through every pane. And you may think thrust is too strong, but wouldn’t it have to in order to bounce off of two doors, across the hallway and land beautifully upon the painting of the children at the beach? It’s almost as if it knows the destination, knows how deserving they are of the light. 

It doesn’t last long, but spectacular rarely needs a lot of time to make its point. It’s in these tiny, well lit moments that I remember how lucky we are. How we are given everything we need, and more! How even in our struggles of darkness, in our failed attempts to reach all that shines…with obstacles lining the way — magically, joyfully, light bends. Golden. 

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Excessive joy and wonder.

I’m expecting something in the mail today. Photos from our recent trip. It’s not a surprise. I ordered them. I paid for them. They gave me an arrival date. Yet, I may as well be six years old, waiting for my package redeemed from Bazooka Joe bubble gum wrappers. 

Our mailbox stood with three others at the end of our driveway. It was not a long driveway, perhaps four to five car lengths. But the urgency to check the mailbox did require the riding of my banana seat bike from garage door to mailbox, to cut down the added seconds of waiting time. I knew it was excessive. But it was impossible to stop. 

After a full morning of making the trip, even while knowing the mail never came before noon, I had to rake the gravel to cover my path of impatience. And also it used up some of the seemingly endless waiting time. 

Rake in hand, and bike at my feet, I heard the popping of the slow wheels. He waved from the opposite side of the car as he pulled up to the boxes. He placed the white letters for Weiss’s, the newspaper for Mullen’s, and then turned back to his bag. He was digging for something. I pierced my lips. My heart as well. Pull it! Pull it! While he was digging, I had to think, “What did I actually order? Was it the camera? The spy glass? Coin purse. It must be the coin purse…” I looked up and he placed the tiny cardboard container in our box. He tapped the horn and popped down the road to Norton’s. Rake upon handlebar, I ran to whatever lay ahead.

I don’t know what today will bring, be it via mailbox or circumstance, but let me be excessive with joy and wonder. With pierced lip and heart, let me race toward it! Let the gravel pop beneath me. 

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A delightful passing.

I suppose some would say the opposite — that my friend Jeannie looks and sounds just like Diane Keaton — and I suppose it is because we’re friends (and friendship will always get top billing) that as I listen to clips of Diane after her recent passing, I think, she sounds just like Jeannie. 

I mention it because, isn’t it delightful when we see it! See the parts of each other that we love, passing through. And it’s never just familial. Oh, I do love it when someone says, “you look just like your mother”!  Nothing could make me happier! But even more miraculous, I see my mom in old friends, new friends. 

Shopping with my friend Katie at the Galleria — (and by shopping I mean delighting in the dress-up as she ran to get boots and necklaces and framed my face in the mirror) — the encouraging words of my mother spilled from her mouth, that told me, outright dared me — to feel great about my reflection!  Because if my mother was going to keep passing through, she would pick the Galleria!

And of course I was staying at Jeannie’s condo, next to the Galleria, texting her possible outfits, and hearing back in Diane’s voice, and my mother’s banter, and it is all such a delightful passing, one may even call it a dance. 

I take comfort in it. Daily. Because the passing is never final, once it begins to dance. 

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When the whip has been cracked.

I could play a semi-recognizable version of “Michael Row The Boat Ashore”, when my guitar lessons were cut short by an arm breaking crack-the-whip incident at the fifth grade Washington Elementary ice skating party. With my plastered arm, I could no longer hold the guitar. Band lessons were about to begin in our gymnasium. I could somehow still hold the clarinet. I joyfully honked once a week under the direction of Mr. Iverson. When they sawed off my cast, I suppose I could have returned to the guitar, but I stayed with the one who saw me through. 

My “instruments” have continued to change throughout my life. By choice and chance, I have had to let in, and I have had to let go. But I’ve always had my voice. How freeing it is to know. Some things can never be taken away. 

I don’t keep that clarinet in my French home because I still play, I keep it as a reminder. A lesson of change. Of adapting. Of finding joy when the whip has been cracked. 

Perhaps it’s why I speak of the bird song so often. Maybe it’s a bit more refined now, but it all began with a honk, a glorious and joyful honk. 

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