Happy New Year

Here in Fairfax, it’s a hot night that smells like honeysuckle. There are people in this town who look like they haven’t changed a bit since 1972, when I was six years old. These are the long-haired, wide-eyed people of indeterminate sex who come out at dusk to dance in the park, turning in circles…

Yesterday I asked my grandfather what he remembers about the Great Depression. His clearest memory is meeting a hungry man on the sidewalk and bringing him to the back door of the family home. My great-grandmother fed the man and gave my grandpa a lecture so stern that it’s still with him today. But our…

The other day, my dad sent me an email correcting one of my posts, Snake Oil, in which I mentioned that I inherited his goofy bow legs and something odd about his teeth. To set the record straight, his feet actually point out like a duck and his knees point more or less toward each…

Down near the bottom of the crossed-out list of things you have to do today, between “green thread” and “broccoli” you find that you have penciled “sunlight.” Resting on the page, the word is as beautiful, it touches you as if you had a friend and sunlight were a present he had sent you from…