Many years ago, a navy chief warrant officer said to me, “Walker, all it takes to erase a thousand ‘attaboys’ is one ‘Aw, shit.’” What he was telling me in his gruff, salty way was that no matter how much good someone does, a single poor performance can wipe it all away, at least in the eyes of the entity with the highest stake in the job, that person also
“Jerome Bernard Parent, what are you doing?” my mother asked. Uh oh. Full name. I’m in trouble. “I’m just reading,” I said, showing her the book. “That’s rude for a guest to be doing. Now go outside with the other kids and play.” “All right,” I said. “In a minute.” I peeked down the stairs. All of the grownups, including my mother, were drinking and talking loudly about the upcoming
I chose the third wave of the set, gliding over water so aqua cool that every cut, bruise, and scar along the way faded into something I never was but am forever becoming. That night, gazing at the sea, I dribbled blood red wine down my shirt. It glowed like a birthmark in the fading sunlight, crystallizing focus in a quieter land, and the lapping waves told me that this
Emotional truth should never get a free pass. All too often, it’s a noisy intruder lashing out in blind frustration. It devotes endless hours to reconstructing bones in the desert in a vain attempt to reanimate an imaginary creature. When it thinks you’re a captive audience, it will usher you into its hail-damaged garden, assuring you that you’re always welcome, so long as you don’t stray too far from the
Most everyone has dreams, some good and some not so much. Every time we drop off to sleep, our hard-worked brains get the chance to screw with us, and who can blame them for exploiting it? The nightmares vary from one person to the next: I’ve known people who routinely dream of being chased by homicidal lunatics, being paralyzed, or reliving childhood trauma, while my wife tells me she has disturbing dreams of driving
Several years ago, before Amazon made book collecting possible with the touch of a computer key, I did it the old-fashioned way. This is a story about cowboys and Indians and a skirmish that took place at the Sand Creek Library Book Sale. I lost. It all started when a flyer tacked up on a bulletin board in the library caught my eye. It read:
