The Task in Front of Me

The Task in Front of Me

During my wife’s six-week stay at the hospital, I realized something important.  I could run a marathon, write the next Harry Potter, take the picture of the year, win a Pulitzer Prize for fiction, build a billion-dollar business, or do all of those things...
Litany Against Fear

Litany Against Fear

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. A friend of mine goaded me into going to the cinema to see Dune. An awkward date, but a brave attempt to make the best out of a bad situation. You see, my wife’s hospital visit—the one where we’ll learn the exact...
Every Day Like It’s Your Last

Every Day Like It’s Your Last

Finally, some good news from the oncologist. Well, sort of. The terms good news, and oncologist don’t exactly go hand in hand. The next step in my wife’s treatment will be stem cell therapy, which is what they call a bone marrow transplant these days to...
The Luxurious Lifestyle of a Writer

The Luxurious Lifestyle of a Writer

How does writing fit into a person’s life? Is it a hobby, a passion, a compulsion—there’s usually little difference between the two—a way of living, a habit, or perhaps a mindset? Often it’s all of those and still not enough to fit into anything...
A Footnote That Stung

A Footnote That Stung

Never would I have guessed that something as small as a footnote could punch me in the face. And yet it did. Two quick jabs followed by a right hook. Here, this comes from Martin Amis’s Inside Story: “An illiterate, underbred book… the book of a...