What Ails Us

Gabor Maté Challenges The Way We Think About Chronic Illness, Drug Addiction, And Attention-Deficit Disorder

Consider all the stresses of life in a society where people feel little sense of control and lots of uncertainty all the time; . . . where relationships are often troubled; where parents are not available for their kids because they’re too busy. Under such conditions, you’re more likely to get sick. Nearly 50 percent of American adults have a chronic illness.

Afternoons

The rooms were filled with the smells of food. The only sounds were those of the house slowly settling around us, and the birds outside in the walnut trees, and an occasional car going by on the blacktop road.

Poor Sparrow’s Almanac

I vowed to write a new series of proverbs to counteract Franklin’s and free Americans from busyness and worry. My goal is to assemble an army of daydreamers.

Pioneers

We checked out of the motel and ate breakfast in an old diner next to a gas station. Teresa ordered a child’s portion of pancakes, and they came with a whipped-cream smiley face. I ordered a skillet named after a World War II battleship.

Let The Bad Times Roll

As Ochs delivered the song’s most incendiary lyric — “Serve your country in her suicide / Find the flag so you can wave goodbye / But just before the end even treason might be worth a try” — McCarthy threw his arms in the air, and the crowd erupted.

The Things They Googled

The things they googled were determined by forgetfulness, by need, by desire, by curiosity, and by the endless availability of information. In fact, there was no point in remembering anything except how to google.

Of All The Mothers In The World

We carry in our bodies a whole host of hurts, of lonely nights, of tiny slights and insults, of guilt for the slights and insults we’ve inflicted on others. If you’re single, you carry the added weight, the secret shame, of knowing that you are first in no one’s heart. You walk the earth with billions of other people, and you are first in no one’s heart.

She Walked Out The Door

For some people life is effortless, like running as a child with no sense of the world turning beneath our feet. It is not that way for you. You will always be aware of the weight of your footsteps and the force of will required to move forward. Anger keeps you together, a mortar that begins to harden.

Selected Poems

— from “Wondrous” | I’m driving home from school when the radio talk / turns to E.B. White, his birthday, and I exit / the here and now of the freeway at rush hour

Gethsemane

When the disciple who loved Him most / unsheathed his sword / and sliced off the right ear / of the high priest’s servant, / we all cheered and stomped the parquet floor / in that February classroom

E-mail Elegy

Dedicated to e-mails from Save Darfur, War Child, Africa Action, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Free the Slaves, AIDS Action, and Doctors Without Borders. | How quietly they land, / bits of global sorrow accumulating like snowfall / as I teach a class, attend a meeting, / make a cup of tea.