Many years ago, I worked as a film and television extra for a few months. Interspersed with temporary jobs at insurance companies and accounting firms, the onscreen background work paid no more than ... [+]
It was 1962, Wichita, Kansas. My Dad surveyed the front yard—a very big front yard, a grim look on his face. "Weeds," he pronounced sullenly, as if our front yard had become the equivalent of ... [+]
PONOS was the personified Greek spirit of hard labor and toil. The wide, gravel path snaked through a scrub meadow joining two working-class neighborhoods. Every kid in the neighborhood walked ... [+]
I don't remember which I encountered first: Helene Hanff's book, 84 Charing Cross Road, or the Anne Bancroft / Anthony Hopkins movie of the same name. All I know is that decades later the title's ... [+]
Christmas presents always took a back seat to certain Christmas foods when I was growing up. My parents gave each child only two presents. When we were young, they were a toy (usually something ... [+]
It wasn't fair. EJ had found him, brought him home, set up a comfy, warm bed of hay in the basement; she'd even named him. But from our first encounter on that cold January night, Mister Peepers only ... [+]
I stand by my front door with car keys in hand, flip-flops on my feet, panic in my heart.
"Let me get this right: I am going to take this gigantic menopausal body," I wave my hand like a Price is
... [+]
Everyone receives gifts they neither need nor want—bath salts for people who only shower, a frilly nightgown wrapped up for someone who sleeps in sweatpants, that 27th tie . . . Sometimes we ... [+]
For Richard
It was 1984 and we were pretending to be spies.
It was one of those "adult" games that twists your arm to mingle. Our host, David, greeted us at the door with a card that had ou
... [+]
Books are gentle companions. Usually.
Except for that one time I was just about murdered by books.
That was twenty years ago . . .
***
I didn't know what to do with my life. I had no
... [+]
I met Mia for the first time at my tennis club. A small Chinese woman with dark brown eyes and short-cropped black hair, she greeted me with a heavy Chinese accent.
"Are you Ken?" she asked.
To my
... [+]
1)
At exactly 5:50 p.m., your mother-in-law will anxiously announce, "Someone needs to go get the crabs right now!" When you first met her, shortly after meeting her son, you called her by he
... [+]
The familiar scent of earl gray tea sends me back to my grandma's living room. When I was in elementary school, I'd come over multiple times a week and we'd sit on her off-white couch drinking black ... [+]
The black man who approached from the rear of the gathering at my father's burial looked to be one hundred years old. He was frail, but not bent. He walked haltingly, supported by two black ... [+]
It's not difficult to imagine a line. First, close your eyes. Remember when you were a child and noticed everything about the world: the light stretching just so across the baseball field, the white ... [+]