Taking Nothing for Granted
My mother developed glaucoma in her early 40s (discovered when my brother sat on her glasses, necessitating an eye exam) and, because it was discovered early, the worst that accrued… Read more Taking Nothing for Granted →
Feeling Memoirish
I have on occasion contributed a series to this blog called “Raised in a Barn.” It is a loose series of anecdotes about my, um, colorful childhood, spent between Greenwich… Read more Feeling Memoirish →
Nowhere Near Fun
I remember the Big Three of Childhood Diseases because I had all of them. I am of that vintage where I was young enough to be vaccinated against smallpox and… Read more Nowhere Near Fun →
Can You Wear the Bottoms of Your Trousers Rolled When You Don’t Wear Trousers?
This photo was taken when Emily, the household dog, was a spry young animal of four or five: she is vigilantly looking out on our street, watching for skateboarders or other dogs. Skateboarders are her particular abhorrence. These days Em doesn’t stand in the window surveilling. Her hearing is not so great, her eyesight’s iffy, and more than that, her knees are in bad shape. When she was about six she tore the right ACL and required surgery (and six weeks of tranquilizers so she would hold still and heal),… Read more Can You Wear the Bottoms of Your Trousers Rolled When You Don’t Wear Trousers? →
At Curious Fictions: Cuckoo
This week: Cuckoo, a story about a woman who adopts a foundling who turns out to be very different from what she expects.
Honey, I Broke the Kids
Let’s say you have a child, and if you’re lucky enough that she arrives with all the correct bits and pieces–spleen and fingernails and skeletal system–you feel a little like… Read more Honey, I Broke the Kids →
This Week at Curious Fictions: Willie
One of my favorite stories, inspired by viewing Kenneth Brannagh’s Frankenstein and wondering what the doctor has against parenthood.
A Loss: Vonda N. McIntyre
Vonda died yesterday. She was one of my favorite writers: the author of Dreamsnake and The Exile Waiting, and the gorgeous The Moon and the Sun, the woman who in passing gave Mr. Sulu a first name. She was a smart, complex, generous person; I always had a sense of “huh, Vonda McIntyre knows who I am,” but that was me being star-struck, not Vonda being a star. She was also a pivotal member of Book View Cafe, and she will be missed by all of us. She finished her… Read more A Loss: Vonda N. McIntyre →
