They say the mountain people on the island of Crete still measure the walking distance from village to village in the number of cigarettes a man smokes while walking. I don’t smoke. I’m an American ex-pat who gets by driving a cab. I don’t know how many...
Photo by Prosthetic Head – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0 At almost 22 years old, I still hadn’t had a real boyfriend. My love life up to that point consisted of unrequited crushes, celebrity obsessions, and a few random hook-ups, my virginity zapped by a guy who’d told...
I imagined the festival – scenic whirl on the great wheel,holding hands and swiveling to watch the white corona reflect in Baltic waters beneath the Hörnbrücke. I believedoutside our window keelboats would compass us to city center, where we would dance through...
A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte / Painting by Georges Seurat Your eyes are languid. Look at the trees and see the hazy dappling of the leaves. Look at the river and see the unmixed points of periwinkle, lapis lazuli, Aegean blue. Who are these...
Photo: Sailko, CC BY 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons In the tropical butterfly house in the gardens of Villa Garzoni there is a piranha. I stand staring for a few moments at the fish with the deadpan face, shimmering reddish yellow scales and huge eyes. I don’t think I’ve...
Photos by Ethan Jacobs The bookbag is a ruse, makes me look competent like I know where I’m going or what I’m doing. I don’t think anyone suspects I’m moving around with contraband: a stolen bundle of bed sheets that used to be white. By dawn, they were blotchy—red,...
