I’m learning patience from the lady who is teaching Eli how to play the violin. She is a long-time public school music teacher, the kind we wish or imagine still ran things there, kind and competent and able to talk to little ones in a way that makes them feel listened to and special, yet …
An acquaintance once told me about a wealthy benefactor in his church, a man who likes to point out that he “isn’t one of those Bible thumpers.” He just believes that it’s a good thing for families to go to church. So he’s donated millions over his lifetime to the building of churches. He is …
Valentine’s evening, after the rush of work and dinner was over, three little boys gathered around my chair. Caleb and Eli each handed me brown lunch bags covered in heart-shaped stickers. Inside Caleb’s was a collection of elaborate cut-out hearts, two Reese’s peanut-butter cups, a little candy bar, and a handful of those confection-sugar hearts …
Several people asked me yesterday if I had heard the news that Anna Nicole Smith was dead. It was as if the whole world had been there to see her collapse, and had no one left to tell, which is always the secret pleasure of dreadful news, that we get to be the first — …
They say that the insane and geniuses are alike in that their minds make unusual connections between ideas. The good news is that I may be a genius. The bad news is that insane people often imagine that they are brilliant. Regardless, I noticed what seemed to be a common thread running through three seemingly …
