Yesterday was good: I shipped a poetry manuscript off to a likely sounding contest, after finally getting the pagination and table of contents to agree; Ate my favorite bagel, spinach w/cheese, and read the intro to Best American Essays 2007, edited by David Foster Wallace, whose prose always knocks me out with delight; Sat in…

When we were teenagers, my sister, in the spirit of sibling rivalry, told me that no one would ever marry me because of the way I ate hamburgers–the outer edges first, saving the juicy middle for last. I wanted that meaty taste to linger. Eventually, I managed to find a husband, maybe because we had…

Yesterday I met a man who collects pens. I do too, but not with such panache. This man has a platinum Lamy and an ornate silver pen so heavy I could not write more than my name with it, and then not easily. He has pens embossed with gold and pens so high-priced that I…

A January article from Mental Floss, “Four Benefits of Writing by Hand,” explains that to write longhand increases understanding when class notes are recopied longhand, slows us down and let’s us think in more complete sentences, provides better focus than using a computer, and engages motor skills and memory that help keep our aging brains…

Recently I told a friend the story of my mother’s diamond earrings and realized that this story says a lot about what we are willing to recycle. Mom loved jewelry and my stepfather, Robert, loved her, so he bought her beautiful rings and earrings. The earrings that I still have are gold buttons with small…