Candace Echols is a Midtown resident, wife, and mother of five. A regular contributor to The Daily Memphian, she is a freelance writer who also recently published her first book, the children’s book “Josephine and the Quarantine.”
There are 113 articles by Candace Echols :
“Paying attention to the world around you and then flapping your lips about it ... starts to feel decidedly one-sided after a while, a bit like talking to yourself out loud for the whole city to hear.”
“Memphis is a fascinating tapestry of subcultures that I suspect is far more complex and nuanced than most of us would ever dream. This is both our bane and our beauty.”
“This parenting journey from crib-to-college goes bizarrely fast. As a mother, I can almost feel as if I’ve been cheated out of something. Mocked. Duped. Ripped off.”
“I have forgotten that outposts are just that – outposts. Outposts offer a roof and a bed and company to the wayfaring stranger, but they are never the final destination.”
“Lately, I’ve been treading in the waters of the mundane. Groceries, laundry, text messages that require responses. Neither a cup of coffee nor the moon have been history lessons that reach backward nor spiritual meditations that reach upward.”
“For several years, I’ve been struggling to pray. For one thing, it’s hard not to get distracted. Thoughts fire this way and that, like ricocheting pinballs.”
“I know I have inherited much of who I am from my dad, who inherited it from his mom. ... The three of us look at life from the same vantage point.”
“There’s something about a good long road trip that creates space for your mind to unwind.”
“In a world that worships youthfulness, it seems counterintuitive that these women would be magnets for those who are younger than they are. But I suspect what they are seeking is something I love too.”
“These are Memphis-only nuances. I never would have noticed them had I not been thinking about writing for fellow Memphians. We all experience these things together as citizens of this particular place.”
“The trunk that reaches to the heavens is telling my family’s story in real time, and real time is passing much more quickly than anyone ever told me it would.”
“When I consider my mother’s version of motherhood, ... I think she can count her wins by what she chose not to do.”
This is an open letter to the woman I had an embarrassingly vigorous yelling match about a parking spot in front of the UPS store on Colonial Road last Tuesday.
“Then you find yourself legitimately considering letting someone slice open your rear to insert a TicTac made of yams that will get you closer to ‘normal,’ whatever that even means.”
“We were proud to be Memphians for a great many reasons, but underneath them all was a sense of citywide unity. For once, we were all on the same team.”
“What started with truth, goodness and beauty has fallen into dissonance. That’s what I hear in the news, gunfire, sirens and gossip. ... I’ve heard the dissonance in the sound of my own complaining voice.”
“Every year on June 21, my brother Landon Williams sends me some version of the same text message ... ‘Hey Sister! Today is the 6-year anniversary of the day when Everett was supposed to die.’”
“We all know anytime there are gifts being opened, anytime there’s ice cream and field trips and dress up and games, anytime someone is empowered to do something they could not do before, there’s a party going on.”
“Macsovits has taken what she’s been taught in the course of a lifetime, married it with the deeper and broader perspective she has earned in motherhood, and is now passing it on to others.”
Echols: Stories of hope, joy, learning: It’s always a party at one special Memphis school
Echols: Stories of hope, joy, learning: Everett beats the odds
“When you get to be an adult, laughter can feel like an add-on like whipped cream, a free mint or pressing snooze on the alarm clock.”
You don’t have to go far to get away from it all. Candace Echols has some ideas for where you can go to catch your breath amid your hectic schedule.
“Why does it feed my soul to gaze across the landscape of Shelby Farms and inhale a whole wide world of greens and blues?”
“When a gaggle of kids come in my kitchen door covered in dirt — all red-cheeked and sweaty — cackling and out-of-breath because of some prank they played or game they made up, nothing makes me happier.”
“Sometimes — especially here in late February — we must do what we can to invite the natural world in, allowing it to carry us until spring arrives.”
“Hair is something most of us have to deal with on a daily basis just to step out the front door. And lately I’ve been having to think about my hair more.”