Budapest Bakery
In the bakery in Budapest, I have to rely on my “have mercy on me” skills. Even when I try to read the tags next to the pastry of my … Continue reading
Writer’s Blah
It’s not been Writer’s Block, but Writer’s Blah. I’ve found many Nice Things lately, but the stories are giving me fits. It’s like I keep pulling burned cookies from the … Continue reading
Refreshing
A set of parents wrangle their two sons near the checkout for the Burlington Coat Factory. While Mom makes final selections and pays, the tallest boy keeps moving toward the … Continue reading
The Impatient Italians and the Fighting Irish
In Medjugorje, there’s a crowd of people entering the church, praying at the grotto, climbing steep hills in prayer. It’s a place of retreat, usually quiet, usually peaceful. This morning … Continue reading
And Are You Happy (As You Wait)?
Sometimes your heart’s desire hung from the highest branch of the highest tree and you could never climb high enough to reach it. Or else you just waited patiently and … Continue reading
Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
The narrow street has two neighboring restaurants. In the first, a woman setting silverware yells at the man behind the register. Her coworker is presumably family. She squeals as he … Continue reading
Pool Rules
In the apartment complex swimming pool, two women have the expanse to themselves. They hold the wall and kick, stretching their legs, exercising between observations about the day. Their graying … Continue reading
A Love Story At Just Over Five Feet
The elderly couple hunches together over their soup. They stay like this, heads tilted toward each other, even as they finish. The waiter reaches under the bridge of their gaze … Continue reading
Fishing With the Straßenbahn-Netz
A man sweeps the sidewalk in front of the hotel, casting gravel into a diminishing snowbank just past the curb. He wears a purple sweater over a white shirt, navy … Continue reading
The Well-Behaved
The baby has more hair than most of Economy Class. Her mother totes the tot in a carrier over her front, like a nervous tourist who carries their backpack over … Continue reading
It Seems The Errands Run You…
A Kindergarten-aged girl walks by displays of shirts, organized by color and size. She runs her hand along the sleeves and gazes up at her mother, who totes a baby … Continue reading
Visas and Patience
He took the window seat and buckled himself in. His adult daughter shuffled belongings around the overhead compartment and gave commentary on her discomfort. He nodded at her words, not … Continue reading
I’m Thinking Lovely
She parks in the first spot outside Arby’s, and he waits patiently in the passenger side, readying his oxygen tank as she comes slowly around the long Buick. She wrestles … Continue reading
Respect
I get to sit by him! The little old Japanese man I spotted back in the glacial airport check-in lines–he’s in my row and he will be spied upon. He … Continue reading
Any Day Now…
All that he had now was an idea that one day something would happen. And he would be taken by a set of events to the place he should go. … Continue reading
The Nice Thing About Strangers 