I’m not alone. There are others out there, but we’re a formless group with no T-shirts, no password, no secret handshake. We don’t have a 12-step program, a 10k run to fund research for our cause or celebrity endorsements. We live among you, as unseen by others as we can be to ourselves. We’re misunderstood, often misidentified,...
Read MoreThe lessons of Scrabble; Good, better, best
I must have been in my late 20s when my mom and I started playing Scrabble together. Even though I fancied myself a wordsmith and trafficked in language for a living, I was a listless and half-hearted player, intimidated by my mom’s skill. To distance myself from the possibility I might not do well, I mocked the game. Goofy little tiles and point scoring:...
Read MoreCity of Diaries; I give you my word
My first diary was a shared one; I must have been 8 or 9. My best friend, Andrea, and I had one of those palm-sized starter diaries for girls with a pink cover, a cheap lock and a faint impression of Tinkerbell in the bottom corner of every page. We made only one entry: the Webster’s Dictionary definition of penis. With my unmoored handwriting, I copied...
Read MoreMy funny friend; Elmo the clown
I was indentured at the University of Florida when I saw an ad in our campus newspaper looking for marketing managers for some unspecified “family focused” entertainment business. The ad promised the trifecta: travel, independence and big bucks. Well, big to me. I was a breakfast waitress in a restaurant lined with aquariums that smelled like dead fish....
Read MorePleasing Anna; Grandmother is hedgehog
It started with Zana and the Albanian lessons. When I turned 40, I moved to Albania for a year to teach journalism. Once there, I immediately hired a language teacher. Language is a decoder ring; three times a week I sat with Zana parroting the goofy, stilted dialogue that is the Albanian equivalent of Look Jane look! See Spot run! Zana stood no higher...
Read More