Good

What I moved to Brooklyn was: three of my paintings, my great-grandmother’s dresser, three busts (Schumann, Chopin, Shakespeare), my yellow foo dogs (look it up), and the lamp I bought the day that Grandma died in an effort to make myself feel better, the lamp which I immediately broke on the threshold of my apartment […]

Six Months

Part of my Lenten practice this year is Seven Sun Salutations, at least, in part, for the alliterative value of that practice. It reminds me of that bit on “Sesame Street” with the baker. “Seven…sun…salutations!” The other part is letting myself mourn my old life. One of my godmothers mentioned to me that it was […]

Flying

My grandfather’s tombstone has a plane etched into the granite. Just a little east of his grave, I visited into the birthplace of Amelia Earhart. I have no idea if my grandfather had any special feelings about Amelia Earhart, who, after all, lived only a brief time in Atchison, Kansas. She was a pilot, like […]

Mercy

There was a sign in front of the hospital that said: “The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed: it blesseth him that gives and him that takes.” I used to drive by it every day. It was in front […]