Fear and Loathing at Splash Mountain

I didn’t ride a roller coaster until I was twenty-one. My life was basically a disaster, as it should be when you are twenty-0ne. I was submerged in a codependent romance. I was annoyed that my first three years of freedom were not more fun than rebelling against my parents. My misery led me to join my family on […]

Worth Blushing For

Although I technically teach English and writing, every year I also end up teaching sex ed. Every year students ask me such terrifying questions as, “I heard this guy jerked off on his back porch, and then a girl in her backyard across the street with her legs open got pregnant. Is that true?” or “Why […]

Nothing Happened

I think from the first time I saw “Sesame Street,” I thought: I want to live in the city! I want to live with a lot of weird people and mismatch architecture and monsters! Get me out of here! I hated that the suburbs were clean and neat. There was no room for my anger […]

Holy Water

Although he is regularly served expensive food, my white cat thinks I’m trying to starve him to death. He woke up early on Orthodox Easter, found the beet-red boiled egg I’d been given, and chewed one end of it off. Scattered around the gnawed egg, I found the pastel foil-wrapped chocolates the priest had sprinkled with […]