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Butter

I went on absorbing Beth’s hostile digs until a new patient stole her attention from me. Louise had a round face, dark curly hair, and a generous, pear-shaped body. Her weight seemed concentrated in her thighs. When she arrived at lunch for the first time, her figure filling the doorframe, Beth’s eyes brightened as if she were an African lion coming upon a gazelle. I could practically feel my tormentor’s focus lift off me.

Mind the Gap

Melissa Deckman on the Challenges and Strengths of Gen Z

The lion’s share of Gen Z organizing on the Left is being done by young women, because they care passionately about the issues. I think there’s less of that drive among young men. Instead there’s a sense of rootlessness. We’ll have to see whether that actually translates into conservative voting behavior or support for certain policies.

still lives

The omen comes in the ruin of a robin’s egg on the sidewalk: fractured blue splattered with the pink makings of a flightless thing. A plum membrane of skin stretched over eyes like bruises. I make the mistake of looking back at this small disaster, and then the calamity of it fingers the threads of my morning.

Such Gifts

He tells me how Mom’s rabbi tried to convince him that life has a purpose, but my brother wasn’t having it. Existence is a tapestry of chaos, he writes, that we impose meaning on to give our lives purpose.

Anger Management

Dr. B. spun a finger in the air, his signal to let the games begin. I think I called Michael a “no-good fucking loser,” a put-down one of my bosses had once leveled at me. I watched Michael’s hands form fists and the whites of his eyes get bigger.

The Ice Age

I could see others finding happiness, but whenever I approached it, an invisible sheet of ice stopped me from getting any closer. I could never cross over to the other side; I could only pound on the ice that never cracked.

No Small Wonder

Dacher Keltner On The Science Of Awe

Emotions aren’t discrete bubbles. They are blending into each other all the time. You might be feeling awe and wonder at the miracle of life, and also realizing that we all die, which perhaps moves you closer to terror. In our work we try to find what’s true in it all.

Pain

Breaking a leg, giving birth, suffering for beauty