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Along For The Ride

Up until two weeks before her death, my mother drove her little Toyota through the streets of Boston every day. She couldn’t do it alone; my father had to help her. He guided her in and out of the car and turned the key in the ignition.

We Are Iran: The Persian Blogs

In the Islamic Republic of Iran, honest self-expression carries a heavy price. Over the last six years, as many as a hundred print publications, including forty-one daily newspapers, have been closed by Iran’s hard-line judiciary. In April 2003 the Islamic Republic became the first government to take direct action against bloggers. Many more bloggers and online journalists have been arrested or intimidated since.

Adrift

Renee and I walked quickly into the sand dunes, out of sight of the water. My last backward glance found the seal pup floating in the surf like a piece of kelp. He haunted my thoughts the entire way home. That night, curled in bed with a pillow, I sobbed off and on for hours. The pup adrift in a tumbling world had cracked open the grief that I had felt the need to hide.

Three Kims

“C is an average grade,” I tell my students. “C means you’re doing just fine. B is a good grade, a better-than-average grade, and an A is an outstanding grade reserved for truly outstanding work.” I’m lying of course, and I suppose they know it. University-wide, the average grade is a B-minus. Higher for some subjects.

My Father, Who Art In Heaven

Dad never believed in heaven. In fact, he was an agnostic until the age of seventy, when he called me to announce that, unlike all the other old people in his Florida retirement condo who were frightened to die and turning to religion, he was now an atheist. It was one of the few times in fifty years that he’d told me anything personal about himself. Amused and grateful, I said, “Good for you, Dad. Good for you.”

The Boy With Blue Hair

“He lives in San Francisco now,” she interrupted me, understanding immediately the apprehension in my voice. “I’ll give you his number,” she added, her words slow and steady and intentional, as if we were speaking in code.

And we were. She wasn’t just telling me where her son lived these days. She was telling me that he wasn’t dead.

Safe Haven

The day my mother and my brother flew in, I went to pick them up at the airport. At first I’d told them I couldn’t be there: I had to teach a class. (Of course, as the instructor, I could easily have canceled.) My mother’s reply was “So help me God, if you make us get a cab, I’ll pick up the goddamn white courtesy phone at the airport, page Mother Nature, and tell her to send Katrina to find you.”