I’m the adult walking at the tail end of a single-file line of about 20 seven and eight year olds. At the front of the line is the Nature Guy. It’s the summer before I start grad school and the …
No one can read your mind. No one can see your brain injury. A cerebellar stroke hits the, well, the cerebellum. My recovery from my cerebellar stroke has been challenging, but people are forever telling me, “You look great.” It …
I once played in a Bowl Game. Yes, this is true. I played for Hofstra College in The Cement Bowl in West Chester Pennsylvania.
You probably don’t believe me—now that I’m old and falling apart—that I ever put on cleats, …
“Hello-o-o, Canada!” I cheered, grinning at my teenage son in the passenger seat. I glanced in the rear view mirror and watched the border checkpoint fade into the horizon behind us. We had officially left Maine and were entering the parish …
Every now and then, my father would cut and hammer, move the wrong way and wedge a splinter into his skin. He’d march into our tiny kitchen and announce, “I done messed around and got somethin’ in my finger again.” …
For a long time, my favorite library was in the laundry room of my apartment building. It sprang up soon after my husband and I moved in, when someone left two cheap bookcases in the basement and a few cartons …
September 8, 2021
Heading out today, my thoughts refuse to settle, draining my mental energy. Escalating issues with a negligent window replacement company; pressure to get quotes to replace a long rotting retaining wall that is housing wasps, at least …
Watching my friend Christy care for her mother, I am awed and a little ashamed. Rosemary is eighty-nine and in hospice. Christy is her full-time caretaker. I’m awed because Christy is oriented toward Rosemary like a new mother with a …
“I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way than this:” – Pablo Neruda, Sonnet XVII
I write with the …
“Promise me.”
In the silence between her request and my response, I panic.
No.
Don’t ask me.
It’s not fair.
You have the advantage – you’re dying.
“Promise … what?” I ask.
She reaches across the restaurant table and rests …