Menopause is an unraveling. All the selves I knew, shed upon the floor in sloughed off skins from which I step out gingerly, naked.
They tell me I am invisible now. Is that another word for free?
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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
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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
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I should've been in New York City, working at the publishing house that offered me that internship back in March. I should've been waking up at 7 A.M
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Yesterday it was sixty degrees outside, so I took my bike out for the first time all winter. I biked across the river to return a pair of jeans I'd bought online the week earlier; it turns out that
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When Wally asks me to punch him in the stomach, I try not to hold back. I let it rip. I set my feet like he taught me to, draw back my fist, and deliver a blow to the spot he's pointing at—right above
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Nature is calling. As a new intern in the medical intensive care unit (MICU) my bladder is not yet trained to resist this instinctual human need. The team has been rounding for six hours, discussing
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Not for me, that pallid substitute in January with its noisemakers and forgotten resolutions. My calendar resets annually with the opening of classroom doors, no
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abecedarian a novice learning the rudiments of a subject, a beginner or amateur; a student; straightforward, simplified; in literature, a work arranged in order according to the alphabet, often
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My hands used to create magic. I think with the increasing demands of adulthood, they've had their spark pulled right out of them. My little sister's hands still glisten with it, but I fear he
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After my father toured what would become our neighborhood in Fairfax, California, he knocked on the nearest door and asked the man who answered if it was nice living there.
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
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It was 1983 and I was six years old, riding between my father and brother in my father's Oldsmobile, back when front seats stretched from door to door. My father drove, and my brother, who was
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I was still uncivilized. Among the Starbucks Wednesday morning commuters who awaited lattes while wearing ties, pencil skirts, and blowouts, I stood out. Air-dried hair frizzed from my head, baggy
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For over four years I worked at a newspaper in Tooele County, a rural desert county in Utah. I had a coworker once say the county is a collection of almosts—it could be almost a fantastic hiking
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A pale, blonde woman in pink scrubs first asks my name and birthday. She has an accent that sounds Scandinavian, and she looks past the tears in my eyes as I answer her questions. She leads me down
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It had been silent for several seconds and I knew I had to say something. "So we're not Italian?" It was the only question I could think of. I could tell my mom wanted more but was relieved I
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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
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