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The man who’d owned the house before us had put in a fallout shelter because he’d thought the Russians were going to drop a nuclear bomb on us. It was in the field behind the house, and my mother had said I was too young to go down there, which didn’t bother me much, because it looked scary and the ladder was steep and you could barely see the bottom of it.
By Stephanie KovenNovember 2006The eviction notice arrives in the mail, just like any other bill or letter. There’s no sheriff, no knock at the door, no sign posted for everyone in the neighborhood to see.
By Frances LefkowitzNovember 2006A loud snap reminiscent of ice cubes cracking in a glass, waiting arms, a broken hammock
By Our ReadersOctober 2006“Tripoli, Havana, Cyprus, Panama, San Juan.” My mother ticks off the names of the places she has lived, chanting them like a prayer. She married my father, a navy man, and followed him from post to post. When I was very young, young enough to sit with her in the middle of the day drinking milk from a plastic cup while she had her afternoon coffee, she would tell me about those places.
By Dawn PaulOctober 2006As a child I thought of my mother and father in terms of centuries. This man and this woman had lived forever, it seemed, born wholly formed and unchanging, waiting patiently for my sisters and me to come along. Had someone told me my parents were, in truth, scarcely more than children themselves, I would have considered it a lie to rival the tooth fairy.
By Eric BosseAugust 2006“Hello there, Kenny Rogers,” he says to the maitre d’; then he turns to my stepmother and me and jerks a thumb at the man as if he were made of wax. “Don’t he look like Kenny Rogers?” My father lets out a horse laugh and pokes the maitre d’ in the ribs.
By Corvin ThomasAugust 2006A big, fat zip-lock bag of white powder; Crohn’s disease, a pair of turquoise earrings
By Our ReadersAugust 2006What can I trust my mother to do? She will usually come when I need her. She will love my children as fiercely as I do, but in an older, less-complicated way. She will frequently enrage me.
By Beth MayerJuly 2006At sunrise you climbed through your bedroom window at the recovery home and found a note waiting on your untouched pillow: “This was your final warning. Pack today.”
By Victoria PattersonJuly 2006Personal, political, provocative writing delivered to your doorstep every month—without a single ad.
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