THE DEEP SOUTH-
“Bus is here,” Nicole bleats.
A rattletrap green school bus, cacophony, paper and gum flying from cracked windows, swings down the ramp and under the covered porch to our door.
LOS ANGELES, CA-
Forgive me, Lord
Last night something happened over at Monroe’s Bar
Started with me minding my own business
Drinking beer in the blue and golden glow of jukebox light
SALT LAKE CITY, UT-
Last summer, my friend Amanda attended Teach for America’s Summer Institute.
Amanda
Teach for America’s Summer Institute is kind of like boot camp for teachers.
LOS ANGELES, CA-
Over Thanksgiving week, lots of stuff happened.
My little brother and his girlfriend got engaged.
LOS ANGELES, CA-
It’s a Friday afternoon
I’m on a folding table in my living room
Getting rolfed by this woman
Who comes highly recommended by friends
SALT LAKE CITY, UT-
For years, I’ve been puzzled by this building, which is located at 1455 South 1100 East in Salt Lake City:
The reason for my puzzlement is this sign, identifying the building as headquarters of the IDFL Institute.
MADRID-
Andy Johnson introduced me to Dorothy last year.
Dorothy and I have recently become good friends.
She asked me if I wanted to try speed dating and I agreed.
“At the least, it’ll be an adventure,” she said.
“Or a decent TNB post,” I said.
SARANAC LAKE, NY-
Mountain towns have a strange social dynamic.
A lot of us live in our own little micro-worlds of specific adventure sports.
We go through phases of being social and then being hermits.
Some weeks the only time I’m around more than two people is when I’m sitting in a gondola stuffed with seven other skiers, riding to the top of Whiteface Mountain.
My thighs crammed against theirs, barricaded by high-tech, abrasion-resistant pants and thermal underwear, might also be the closest I get to touching another human being some months.
November is all about the buildup in this town.
SALT LAKE CITY, UT-
What with our cultural obsessions with body image, weight gain and loss, etc., I imagine that by now many of us are familiar with somatyping, the body type classification system developed by American psychologist William Sheldon in the middle of the twentieth century.
PARIS-
My fiancée and I have been together for over three years and will marry in December, despite the following two facts:
I love sports.
And I am a practicing Catholic.
Maybe in a future story I’ll discuss the former, and how she must really love me, because she is probably the only Frenchwoman in the world who knows how to keep score at a baseball game, but today, as we approach our wedding day, I thought it might be interesting to write about the latter. (more…)
COLUMBIA, MD–
Everyone has a cause, something that stirs them to participate in humanity.
Some people campaign for Darfur aid while others are donating members of the ONE Campaign.
LAS VEGAS, NV-
“You heard him, Wykowski, into the water.”
—Sgt. Toomey, Biloxi Blues
When I was twenty-five I broke up with my girlfriend of two years. It was very sad but it had to be done. She came over to my apartment, got her things and that was it. It was over. A couple of nights later I had too many beers and called my brother, Gabriel. I told him that I felt like crap, that I was a wretched person, that I cheated her, that she was a good girl, just not the girl for me.
SEATTLE, WA-
I sometimes think about heaven and wonder if the place really exists.
I’d like to think that it does, of course.
Who wouldn’t?
Obviously, if there is no afterlife to look forward to then the only alternative would be to expect a complete, utter abyss filled with absolutely nothing. (more…)
SACRAMENTO, CA-
One of the most interesting phenomena of the Internet is the way it can easily turn an average person into a somebody.
Some people probably would become famous on their own.
Like the band OK Go, which already had a few albums out before their YouTube video of “Here it Goes Again” became an Internet Cult Classic, earning them a spot on the MTV Music Awards this year.
But the Internet hasn’t only made obscure bands famous. (more…)
SAN DIEGO, CA-
My friend, Grant, was on the track team in high school.
He quit.
He told me, and I remember this visibly, that someone on the
team (maybe a captain, maybe not) that one of the runners told him that running
brought him “closer to God.”
SALT LAKE CITY, UT-
After Kelly’s mother and grandmother told him to “Get out and don’t come back until you change your attitude!” when he asked them to respect his authority in regard to raising his son Kody, Kody moved up to the house in front of which the Surveillance Van was still parked.
