The night before my birthday this year, I lay in bed and shed a few burning tears while thinking about what I would write for this annual occasion. Typically my process for writing these birthday posts consists of reflecting over the past year and trying to find a simplified narrative of a) what happened and…
Every time someone I’m talking to brings up the coronavirus or the administration’s response to it, my throat tightens. I’m not sure why this happens— I think it’s because I have so many frustrating feelings about the whole thing, and yet it feels absolutely pointless to me to lay them all out, because rehashing the…
It’s been 57 days of Coronavirus Lockdown™, and I think my days are starting to fall into a new routine. Everyone’s been writing about how easily we as people can adjust to a new normal, but to be honest, lockdown me is not so different from the pre-lockdown me. I am, and have generally always…
I first came up with the idea to do some kind of piece about my behavior on my phone when I realized how often I pick up my phone to do one thing and end up doing another thing altogether. The idea was that I would track everything I did on my phone for a…
My parents always said that I was “mature” for my age, which now, looking back, may have been their way of expressing relief that I was fairly easy to manage as a child. Over the summer, I asked my mother to bring me some knitting things from my old stash, and she was very amused…
I have lived my life for the past eighteen years according to the familiar rhythm of the school year. Semesters and midterms and breaks formed my notion of time, and I was always working toward something specific, be it a diploma, certification, or award. My academic life has shaped my perception not only of the…
Mother found a lump on the side of her head today, above her ear. She showed Anita in the car, as they waited for Susie to finish her piano lesson, pulling her hand to it like she had eight years before, but now it was to her head instead of to a breast long gone.…
It’s Valentine’s Day, which, for an occasion that barely constitutes as a holiday, seems to receive more polarizing press than it deserves. I guess it’s because, with its flow of reminders that you either are or are not in a fulfilling relationship, people find themselves lumped into some box or other and naturally become intensely…
Hear me out— I’ve spent the past week binge-listening to comedian Allison Raskin’s scripted podcast Gossip, and it’s absolutely delightful. As a chronic eavesdropper – I can’t help myself! – this podcast is a dream. It’s akin to revisiting the same coffeehouse every week, listening to the ladies in the corner table, and being able…
While turning twenty felt like the end of an epoch, twenty-one feels rather quiet and inconsequential. Besides the practical aspect of having finally turned an age that my peers have all been for months, I’m looking back on the last year and, uncharacteristically, don’t have much to say. Sure, things happened. But they all sort…
