Absence Makes the Hatred Grow Stronger
On the particular exhaustion of being back in your mother's hometown, and why some daughters don't miss the phone call.
The Ultimate Compliment
A neighbor's offhand compliment becomes proof I escaped my mother's script entirely. On being told you're nothing like the woman who raised you.
The Body of Evidence
Neighbors in Guatemala remember my mother as "El cuerpo." A force of nature. A woman they speak about in awe. I inherited her face. I'm trying to figure out if I also inherited the thing that broke her.
Love, a Secondhand Emotion
I don’t remember being in love. I was thinking about it the other day, thinking about when the ex and I started dating, and I don’t remember the feeling I must have had of being in this all-consuming passion for another person.
Deep Thoughts: What If I Made It Worse?
One time when we were living in Virginia, I bought a stranger a bus ticket. I don’t know what possessed me, and to this day I wonder if I actually helped that person? You’re supposed to wonder about the small things other people do for you that you can never pay back. But what if instead we wonder about the things we do for other people that we never hear about again?
