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The Summer We Didn’t Say Goodbye
There are some summers that don’t feel real until they’re over. The air hangs heavier. The sunsets last longer. And every moment feels like it’s trying to tell you something you just don’t know what yet. Claire still thinks about that first date on the back road. It wasn’t planned. Not officially. He texted her…
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Sweaters, Static, and Almost
The first thing Claire noticed about fall that year was the smell. Not just pumpkin spice drifting from café doors or apple cider simmering in crockpots at church gatherings but the sharper scent beneath it all. The scent of change. Crisp leaves cracking under boots. Cold air settling into the spaces between breaths. The kind…
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Dust, Dogs, and the Disappearing Man
The dream started with a plan. We were supposed to meet at a roadside market just outside a tiny country town, the kind where the gas station sells bait and the diner closes at two. The sky hung low and silver, heavy with the threat of rain, and the air smelled like wet dirt and…
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Breathing Again
There is something sacred about the moment you realize you can finally take a full breath. Not the shallow kind. Not the tight, cautious inhale that sits high in your chest. I mean the kind that fills your lungs all the way down. It softens your shoulders. It reminds you that you are still here.…
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Learning to Stand
Claire Hart grew up in Owl Creek, Wyoming. It was a town so small that everyone knew which pickup truck belonged to which family. The loudest argument most weeks was about high school football. The courthouse had two courtrooms and a clock that ran five minutes slow. As a child, Claire used to sit on…
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Things I’m Learning While Chasing My Dreams
Life changes have a way of exposing just how tightly we’ve been holding on to people, expectations, old stories, and a sense of control that was never really there in the first place. When everything around you starts to shift, the instinct is often to grip harder, to manage every detail, to make sure nothing…
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Real Life Update
I endured a long stretch in a difficult work environment. Finally, it was time to start fresh. I took on a new job. The last place I worked left me drained. It had a toxic culture that slowly chipped away at my confidence and creativity. It took some time for me to see how much…
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Where the Map Begins
Elijah had always thought heartbreak would be louder.He imagined slammed doors, shouting matches, something sharp enough to mark the ending. Instead, it came quietly across a small wooden table in a café he and Hannah had gone to since they were sixteen. She traced the rim of her coffee cup while telling him she didn’t…
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Meet me under the Porch light.
There’s a certain feeling that doesn’t disappear, no matter how much time passes. It softens. It settles. It tucks itself into the quiet corners of your life and waits patiently, like it always knew you’d come back. In small towns, nothing really leaves for good. Not the old tire swing behind the school. Not the…
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Petals & Pocket Magic
There is a particular kind of quiet you can only find when no one is watching you. Not the kind that falls in an empty room, but the soft, living quiet of a place that doesn’t expect anything from you. A path lined with wildflowers. A garden just after rain. A forest clearing where the…
Quiet Harbor Writing 