A hard rain fell on New York City today. It was one of those more memorable rains where even if you’re not out in the thick of it, the way it’s just lapping at the windows in intermittent sheets has everyone staring outdoors like they’ve never seen rain before. Maybe, too, it’s the way the […]
Category: Essays
A collection of essays and thoughts
Facing a little anxiety, or the time I accidentally took Daisy Mae’s pills
From the door of my apartment, the train station is almost exactly a seven minute walk. That’s five-and-a-half blocks and crossing the street once. The walk passes a gas station, a bagel shop (with terrible service but the best bagels you’ve ever had), multiple laundry mats and auto part stores, several residences, and at least […]
The Freedom and Imprisonment of Being a Toddler, or Vacationing in Virginia
Through a large swath of Virginia, there’s a road called the Skyline that hugs the Appalachian trail at the top of a series of mountain ridges. It’s basically exactly what you’d imagine it should be: pristine views, stretches of asphalt where you find yourself driving under, through, and above the cloudline, rain that pops up […]
On Migration
You may already know the first book of the Bible, Genesis, literally translates, “Beginnings.” The very next book, Exodus, means “mass migration.” We are made. And then, we go. And that story is repeated constantly throughout our holy texts. It’s Adam and Eve banished. It’s Abram’s journey out of his homeland. It’s Joseph sold into […]
The Boonton Line
I took the Mount Olive train to Gethsemane and slept through the Conductor’s call for tickets until, somewhere near Dover, or maybe it was Denville, keeping the vigil came back to me, so I woke up — It’s as if the rail car were a little grotto I saw with a friend from year’s ago, […]
The Death of Poverty
A couple years back I was riding a taxi through the Sahara during a terrible sandstorm on what should’ve been a one-way road (but wasn’t) with zero visibility. There were seven of us crammed into the taxi, a rundown Mercedes Benz, and the driver had what appeared to be the early stages of glaucoma in […]
A Tiny Smidgen of Hope
In the midst of the election aftermath, I admittedly feel a lot like I’ve been thrown into one of those impressionist or baroque paintings on the walls of Hogwarts. I can see everything happening around me, as though it’s happening in a world I don’t belong in or understand. And I can do little more […]
All Hail the Storm King
There’s something monstrous and all-encompassing about New York City, as though the longer you’re there, your memory of the way the world works elsewhere is slowly cached until it fades into oblivion. Everywhere about the City, nature prevails. The pigeons come close and tilt their heads to look at you as though you’re the one […]
Lead Us Not Into Penn Station
I’m not sure why, but lately, I’m hypersensitive to all the sounds that surround me. Maybe it’s because I’m used to a more rural environment that the sounds of the City are just that jarring to me. Maybe it’s because I’m living just next to the Garden State Parkway, which leaves in its wake a […]
Stories from Morocco, or Remembering My Encounter with the Muslim Faith
With all that’s been said about Islam lately, I thought I’d take a moment to republish something I wrote after returning from my time as a Peace Corps volunteer in Morocco. This is a slightly edited version of a talk I gave to local churches and a local rotary club in Tennessee: Act 1. Arrival. […]
