Browse Topics
Friendship
The Button
On a warm summer afternoon not long ago, my friend Brian and I were sitting on the lawn in front of my apartment. It was Friday, and, as usual, I hadn’t crossed off many items on my to-do list for the week. I had my laptop outside, but I couldn’t concentrate, partly because it was finally sunny after several days of tiresome drizzle, but mostly because Brian kept interrupting me.
October 2006Breathe
For four consecutive Saturday mornings when we were in ninth grade, Brian Henderson and I went to a second-floor office above the pharmacy downtown to breathe. We woke at eight o’clock. We could not brush our teeth or eat.
August 2006
Under The Apple Tree
When Joe left me sitting under the apple tree and started to walk across the meadow toward my trailer, he looked back and waved, and then walked on, and then he did a complete circle with his arms out, like he was embracing the world. That made me laugh, because he was so happy and willing to show it.
August 2006
Neighbors
Buddhists and nudists, Peace Corps volunteers, Quakers spinning in their graves
June 2006
Sweethearts Of The Rodeo
We tore across the back field, our heels digging into their sides. We pulled them up short and did somersaults off their backs, or handstands in the saddle. We turned on a dime. We jumped the coop, the wall, the ditch. We were fearless. It was the summer we smoked our first cigarettes, the summer you broke your arm. It was the last summer, the last one, before boys.
June 2006
Begin With An Outline
Besides the bananas, my dad raises chickens and grows red ginger and marijuana. I’m not sure how large his drug operation is or how much money he makes. I know that he smokes a lot of pot, but not so much for recreational purposes. It’s more about testing his wares. He rolls joints. He doesn’t own a bong, hookah, pipe, chillum, vaporizer, scale, dugout system, grinder, or steamroller. He’s old school.
January 2006
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