This is an odd sort of story with a small kernel of truth in it. Growing up, there was a man who used to sit in the middle of the food court and people watch. He seemed to always be there every time I went to the mall. Then I left for college. Home from…
I have more stories and poetry to post here, but today I am thinking about the ones that I haven't held onto-- the stories I let get lost on an old hard drive instead of transferring them to the new one. Most of these stories held at the heart of them a dying friendship, but…
This is an odd short story I wrote while studying abroad in London. Later, I recorded myself reading it out loud for an audio-zine one of my friends put together. Originally titled, "Shopping Cart Freedom," I think that I found a much better title that suits the story. Skyscrapers from my time in Israel A…
Last week, I mentioned giving some critical analysis of the story I shared, "In Transit." I normally hesitate to give an analysis over my own writing because I am a big believer in reader created meaning. Once something is able to be read by an audience, authorial intent doesn't matter as much to me as…
Out of April and back to short stories and personal essays. This short story is one that I wrote while studying abroad in London and taking a creative writing class at London Met. My creative writing class was concerned about "place." This short story bent that theme as far as I could take it by…
The summer my Grandpa Wally fell, the hospital conditionally released him to a nursing home for a week of physical therapy. I remember the look on his face when they put him in his temporary new room and the words out of his mouth, "Get me the hell out of here." There was nothing I…
After I finished writing this story, I sat back and realized with some amount of awe that it featured the first Jewish characters I had ever written. I have shared before how many of my early short stories featured male protagonists. I wrote this story, whose main character isn't only Jewish but also female, after…
While unpacking old notebooks, I stumbled upon the original ending of this story. Much more verbose and not quite as clever, that ending was the first piece of this story written. It made me think of transformations where two things are key: putting in the effort and letting things organically grow. A story won't sit…
The Casper Humanities Festival kicked off Tuesday evening with a book club discussion of "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The story has been a favorite of mine since I first read it in college. I have long admired Gilman's ability to enact social change with such a creative and captivating story. Who knew…
