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Privacy
The Laughter Club
It’s not surprising that trauma is the number-one killer of people under forty, but it had never been so obvious to me before I worked at a hospital.
June 2015My Sister, The Writer
My sister is a writer. She writes terrible things about me. She thinks she is telling the family secrets, but we all think she’s hysterical.
January 2005For The Man Upstairs
Without hesitating, I carried the pie out into the hallway, and climbed the flight of stairs to the third floor, where I knocked boldly on the man’s door. Not a sound from inside. I breathed deeply; the air seemed thinner up here. While I waited, I examined the way the purple syrup had bubbled over the browned pastry. After a minute I set the pie down before the threshold and turned to leave.
June 1998Denial
How old is the habit of denial? We keep secrets from ourselves that all along we know. The public was told that old Dresden was bombed to destroy strategic railway lines. There were no railway lines in that part of the city. But it would be years before that story came to the surface.
October 1994The God Of My Childhood
Killing God; discovering orgasms; feeling connected by a giant, invisible web linking all things
July 1991A Few Lessons They Won’t Forget
The Disgrace Of Modern Schooling
While teaching means different things in different places, seven lessons are universally taught from Harlem to Hollywood Hills. They constitute a national curriculum you pay for in more ways than you can imagine, so you might as well know what it is. I intend no irony here. These are the things I teach, these are the things you pay me to teach.
May 1991