The Moment of Lift

The Moment of Lift

One day, spring semester 1981 in my American Humanities class at Ursuline Academy of Dallas, we viewed a slide of Mary Cassatt’s Mother and Child. As a young and somewhat pretentious teacher, I pronounced Cassatt’s last name in French—apologies to my students. Also,...

Rules

One day at the Recovery Café, James raised his voice, disturbing others. This wasn’t his first incident. He was out of control and probably off his meds. “You have gotten yourself cut off from almost every place of support in this city,” one of the counselors said to...

Callings

Magazines had piled up: three weeks of New Yorkers, The Atlantic Monthly, National Geographic, The New York Review of Books, Writer’s Chronicle, Smithsonian, Creative Nonfiction, Poets & Writers, and a few education periodicals. I also had several unread e-books...