In this collection of short prose, 30 years accruing, Jan Seale takes on everything from student bloopers to sparrows, navel-gazing to needles, silkworms to Southern sayings. Her words, sprinkled with wit and soul, suggest that our ordinary world is rife with meaning, there for our simple notice with lament or celebration. Life itself is the magician.

These 45 essays offer humor, thoughtful observations, surprising connections among seeming unrelated information, and above all, ways to know the surprising charm in the commonplace.