After two hours our single engine Cessna Caravan turbo-prop begins to descend. The landscape hasn’t changed much for several hundred miles except now there are more desolate looking peaks and valleys. Bleak and no signs of life…of any kind. What could I expect? We were flying over the most restricted portion of the oldest desert…

Excerpt from 1999: an eye-opening medical memoir By Renée Richards, MD I flew out Wednesday morning and got to Tampa in time to play a full 18 holes. I left by myself a day earlier than my closest friends, who joined me Thursday afternoon, Les Pollack and his wife Yvonne and Steven Greenberg—my pediatric ophthalmology associate…

If you focus on those foods and meals that you enjoy and look forward to, you will be much less tempted to indulge in those awfully addictive processed foods again. The reason why we are so attracted to processed foods is because they are fairly inexpensive and convenient. That’s the keyword, convenient. That’s how they…

Kevin Hannigan watched Cooper from a distance. Even though Cooper never said a word, the kid was still annoying to Kevin. And an easy target for some fun. Who would he tell? Kevin smiled at that thought. As he got closer, he saw that Cooper appeared to be asleep, an even better opportunity to frighten…

Short Story about the mystery of the Christmas lights.

Pareidolia is the human ability to see shapes or make pictures out of randomness. Faces in clouds, animalism rocks, and figures on the ceiling.

When the phone rang that late Friday afternoon in September, I answered without thought. I shouldn’t have been surprised when I heard what my doctor had to say. After all, I’d already had an ultrasound, an MRI, and a needle-biopsy, but my innate optimism, my desire to always find a half-filled glass even among its…

Getting from the back of our attic to the master bedroom can involve (A) 50 paces and 14 stairs or (B) one large step. Usually I take the 50+14 because it doesn’t include smashing through a plasterboard ceiling with my body followed by a drop of ten feet to the floor and the possibility of…

We didn’t know it for sure at the time, but I think some of us suspected it: our long summer, which had lasted like twenty years, would end in a letter personally addressed to each and every one one of us. The letters were from Uncle Sam began with the word “GREETINGS

Oh, hi. Yes, sure, you can sit here. Crowded isn’t it? Yes, The 49 Bus is usually crowded this time of day. People going to work and shopping and the school kids, you know.

An unforgiveable family debt brings Jack Perle from the shtetls of Eastern Europe to the docks of Philadelphia where he plots to collect from those closest to him.

In 1999 Dr. Renée Richards kept a detailed diary of her personal and professional life. An internationally renowned eye surgeon and teacher, her specialty was strabismus, a condition where the eyes do not properly align. It was an eventful year. Medical practice was changing to managed care and she adapted. The hospital she had helped…

A rollicking, fast moving tale of a family separated by a big bump on a rain-soaked country road. Two-year-old Oscar Ferguson bounces out of the back of the old family truck in backwoods Appalachia and is found by Amelia and Oliver Shagnasty, who raise him as their own son. Oscar’s brother, Randolph, is adopted from…

The Blinking Game: An African American Woman Experiences India As a kid growing up in rural Illinois I learned a lot from our cow Lucy. When I wanted to get her attention, I would flail my arms in front of her face, point and direct her to “eat that grass over there!” Lucy would just…

Unk played the violin–well, he called it a fiddle–but he’d never play it when anyone was around. Except for Eleanor. He’d play it for her. But then they’d been friends for over seventy years, since they were babies. I think Unk was always sweet on her. That’s not to say they dated or anything, not…