Suprise Me

Some say death can be your ally. Yeah, maybe… If you’re an Inuit shaman or a Yoruba priestess. Some days I can dig it. Mostly I doubt that death teaches us anything. Today marks the year-one anniversary of ZL’s death. I first met Z when she ran into a theater rehearsal and shouted “they’re gonna… Read More

With This Ring I’m not superstitious or especially sentimental,  and that’s a good thing because over the years I’ve lost some precious pieces of jewelry –  two or three watches,  innumerable earrings,  and even a few wedding rings. When we married my husband gave me a simple band – not of gold or silver but… Read More

The case of wine slid across the carpet and the bottles fell out. With a crash, one broke. Read More

I am nostalgic for many things but not all.  Here is a quick take on some of the items from the 50s and 60s I don’t miss. Women’s clothing:  Panty girdles, with their tourniquet-like grip on my thighs. I’ll spare folks the details of feminine hygiene products and accessories of the 60s, but suffice it… Read More

"My grandfather acquired my grandmother in 1912, in Tianjin, Northern China. He named her Esther. I don’t know what she was called before." Read More

In the 70’s, we didn’t have cell phones (of any kind!).  There was no Internet.  A computer was something largely out of science fiction, or something you might use at NASA and if so, it was large, expensive, and had the processing power of your (non-Apple) digital watch today. I remember playing a lot of… Read More

During my 16 months in Chicago in the late ’70s, I lived in a structure known as a “4+1”, as it had parking under the building, then four floors of apartments above, on the north side of Chicago, off of Sheridan near Lake Michigan. The building was H-shaped and I lived all the way at… Read More

There were three possible lunches on school days: regular lunchbox lunch; rainy day lunch; and lunch at home. On regular days, I opened my metal lunchbox (blue lid and bottom, silver-gray between) to find a sandwich neatly wrapped in waxed paper, made with stiff, dense, brown whole wheat bread. It might be peanut butter, or… Read More

This is about another person’s temptation, a very little person. I was getting some provisions in between snowstorms and was riding up and down the aisles of a large grocery store in one of those electric carts. I had paused to read some labels. Around the corner in front of me come a mom and… Read More

The desire and frustration built up Read More