If someone asked us to sketch a map of the world from memory, most of us would place where we live somewhere near the center. That’s simply how perspective works. The place where our life has unfolded becomes the point everything else is oriented around. I...
I used to believe that, with enough planning, I could fit more than sixty minutes into every hour. Even when I knew a drive reliably took twenty minutes, I convinced myself I could bend time just a little. Maybe today I would get all green...
We return to certain phrases when the world feels unsteady. They come back to us almost automatically, the way a familiar room does when the lights go out. One of those phrases is Mister Rogers’ reminder to look for the helpers. When things feel frightening,...
In 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, the girls were given a small terrarium with two green frogs inside. They named them Franklin and Lime. The frogs were instantly beloved. The girls built them houses out of Magna-Tiles, made them tiny hats, played nature...
When we repainted our kitchen cabinets, most of what lived inside them had to be moved out of the room. My husband carried stacks of dishes to closet shelves and tucked small appliances out of sight, leaving behind just a few plates and bowls and...
January has a way of making us restless. The year opens up with an immediate ask for more intention, more focus, and more goals. The stores and the screens promise a better life if we meet the year with more effort. I remember my last semester...
I was stopped at a red light, watching the flurry of activity in the intersection. Cars moved through in every direction, and as I waited, my eyes landed on a man standing near the base of a streetlight. He held a handwritten sign that said...
Sobot is a robot made of scraps of wood. His head is colored red. He has big brown eyes. Glued to the top of his head is a small piece of mirror, already scratched and worn, pulled from the same bin of odds and ends...
Every year, we decorate the tall trees in our front yard with warm white lights. It’s one of our small traditions. The lights wrap tightly around the trunks, then travel upward, thinning as they reach the branches, until the trees seem to glow from the...
The Uber driver hopped out before I could reach for the trunk. He lifted my bag, then paused and bent to pick something up from the ground. “A penny,” he said, holding it up between two fingers. “It’s my lucky day.” I joked that finding good...