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An Omelet For Louie

I don’t know why certain faces are magical for me, why a particular set of features should seize me with the conviction that all of love and meaning can be found in the way an eyebrow lifts, or the way the corner of a mouth tucks in to suggest a smile. But Louie’s face always seemed like such a miracle.

In Light Of Death

An Interview With Rick Fields On Living With Cancer

My attitude is “I’m going to live until I die,” which is all anyone can do. I don’t see the value of having someone say, “You have four months to live.”And I don’t want to give that much weight to any one person’s opinion, whether they’re a seemingly enlightened, spiritual person or a super Ph.D. or an M.D. — fortunetelling has never interested me.

Of Sorcery And Dreams

An Encounter With Carlos Castaneda

Death is the one inexorable fact in our transitory lives. Perhaps I will die a doddering old fool; perhaps I will die before the sun sets tonight. But I will die — that much is certain. In the meantime, what remains within my control is the groove of my life, the track upon which I choose to walk between the exclamation of my coming and the ellipsis of my going. At its purest, this track is trackless, like a path covered by freshly fallen snow. And trodding such virgin paths is the most enduring image of my adolescent dreams. By speaking directly to that memory, Castaneda has reawakened it within my heart. Given the perilously low ebb I have reached in life, I can only describe this feat as a genuine act of sorcery.

Which Way To Siloam?

I turned my head to look at the woman on the bed to my left, and felt a jolt of shock. Carlos was bent over her and, with two hands, stretching apart the skin over her stomach. A tumor the size of a cantaloupe was slowly extruding through the opening, and the woman had raised her head to stare at the thing in amazement.

Miracle Cure

I saw the whole thing in my rearview mirror. In the final seconds before fate in the form of a silver Volvo station wagon collided with me, I was fascinated by the slow unraveling of the inevitable. I was stopped in traffic, a car in front of me, cars to either side of me.

Last Day At Lemon Acres

At 4:30 that afternoon Jack was sitting up in a chair, his polished, old man’s legs crossed, eyes staring intently at the floor. My heart turned a little pirouette: it was the first time he’d been out of bed on his own in six weeks.

Saying Its Name

When Illness Is A Secret

I swore to hate the woman who told me to undress, who sat me on the examining table, and who took my father away to talk with him outside my presence. I hated her for her chilly brusqueness, for having seen me in my underpants, and for having mentioned within earshot the words cystic fibrosis.

Interview With The Witch Doctor

Nestled among a thousand acres of banana trees in the foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro, the Lutheran compound is a haven of modern conveniences. But in the surrounding village the people remain steeped in tradition and still rely on witch doctors to solve problems.