Early in the morning, I got into my car after a workout and saw that I had forgotten to move my passenger side seat back to its original position. My grandson had visited, and I had shifted it as far possible forward in order to accommodate the car seat in the back. Grandson. As I... Continue Reading →
Route 66, Mariska Hargitay, and Joe Kenda: Reflections on the Death of the Great American Road Trip
Driving across the USA is an exhilarating adventure. There is no better way to rekindle the love of this country than to experience it via epic road trip. The best parts of the adventure, are of course, in the offbeat places you come to stay. Many of those-Tucumcari,NM, Holbrook, AZ, Amarillo, TX--reference Route 66, the... Continue Reading →
Requiem for an Intellectual
The last time I traveled this path, I was just out of grad school. My husband and I decided to go out to Arizona to see his best friend before he took a full time teaching position at a private school. We piled into our white chevy van with his signed teaching contract in the... Continue Reading →
Everything Old is New Again: Jamie Lee Curtis, Halloween, and the Death of Hope
With great enthusiasm, I grabbed guests and headed for a showing of "Halloween." Since learning that Jamie Lee Curtis would star in a new iteration of the franchise had me excited. The supreme court debacle and bizarre permutation of the "Me Too" movement had left me weary and ready to see a woman of age... Continue Reading →
Consider Job: Hurricane Florence and Losing My Religion
"In the land of Uz, there lived a man named Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared G-d and shunned evil." Job 1:1 In Emerald Isle, NC on this Monday, September 24, folks are picking up the pieces of their lives. Emerald Isle is a beach town, but it is also a community... Continue Reading →
The Ghosts of Emerald Isle
The journey that brought me to a table in a small Emerald Isle coffee shop in the days following the devastation of Florence began in my parents' house in May of 2011. It was in that place and at that time (a late afternoon it was, bright sunshine, warm spring) that I heard the saddest... Continue Reading →
The Polar Bear
I. The nightmare memory of the polar bear haunted her every waking moment-- the huge white monster in his "environment," lethargic, glassy-eyed, thin, dingy, stained fur. She imagined that he longed for either freedom or death. The hot North Carolina sun beat down on his habitat in the dream/memory, and the water was never even... Continue Reading →
Master’s Thesis Redux
Are we waiting for the end of time? Are we waiting for the end of light and air? Are we waiting, or are we wishing for a conclusion to this business, life? Are we waiting to care about the deaths of billions? Are we waiting for an exorcism? Are we waiting for permission to kill?... Continue Reading →
The Tower of Babel: Reflections on Personal Responsibility in the Age of Neo-Facism
In the Biblical story of Babel, the peoples of earth come together to build a tower that attempts to reach the heavens. For this act of hubris, the tower is destroyed by the Creator, and the peoples of the earth are scattered and (significantly) separated by languages. This story always haunted me as a child.... Continue Reading →