It starts with the warning, far away, in another land. — Things are not going well, and people are going to die. Oh, I say, that’s terrible, but that country is so disorganized, so backwards, so inhumane. It couldn’t happen here. It gets worse, and we judge them. Serves them right for living that way. Someone leaves there and brings the…

After 6:00 O’clock it’s all good. — He never pours a drink before 6:00 PM. Never. It was what his parents did, an hour or so before they started bickering at each other in the night. As a promise to his wife, he never goes to bars, but paces, alone in the kitchen, hovering above an empty…

The Endless Fall in the Heart of Depression — Imagine you are on a water slide. Or in one, as the case may be. Your skin is painted the thin color of the plastic tube absorbing the sun, shading your body in a rainbow as you wait tentatively on the edge of the drop. …

An Elegy to an Alcoholic My mother gave my father an ultimatum when my brother and I were small. Never drink in a bar. This was to stave off the possibility of drunk driving, and its inevitable, horrific, consequences. Never let the children know how much he drank, how deeply…

When you find out that you are not enough, that all you do and all you feel is perceived differently than you thought, it is a kind of death. It is not enough to push through the pain, to put one’s head down and say I can do this, I…

The Cruelty of Children and Adults We Never Unlearn — Step One: Unfriend your co-worker on Facebook, but don’t tell them (duh) Step Two: Start laughing hysterically with the other co-workers in the room about something she found on Facebook, and share it with them. On Facebook, and in the room. Step Three: Go from desk to desk of the…