Home. It's such a simple word, one I never knew would come to mean as much to me as it has. It once was my dad's house, then my uncle's farm. Mostly it's meant wherever Charlie and I were together. Now, though, it's you. It's your letters, your words...
It was Don Paolo's birthday and all the people of the village were gathered in the piazza to celebrate him. The band played, the wine flowed, the children danced, and, as he stood for a moment alone under the pergola, a little girl approached the the...
But these weren't the kind of monsters that had tentacles and rotting skin, the kind a seven-year-old might be able to wrap his mind around--they were monsters with human faces, in crisp uniforms, marching in lockstep, so banal you don't recognize th...
Knightley Academy stood out against the moonlight in silhouette, a ramshackle collection of chimneys, turrets and gables. Both boys stopped to take in the sight of the manicured lawns and tangled woods, the soaring chapel and the ivy-covered brick of...
There is a rustle of dead leaves. Dried sap, a branch crack, the whirring teeth of Mr. Omaru's saw. My father--my real father--is a limb that got axed off the family tree a long time ago now. My mother coughs and cleans phantom juices off her silver ...
I look for my sister but it's hopeless. The goggles are all fogged up. Every fish burns lantern-bright, and I can't tell the living from the dead. It's all just blurry light, light smeared like some celestial fingerprint all over the rocks and the re...
We are fragmented into so many different aspects. We don´t know who we really are, or what aspects of ourselves we should identify with or believe in. So many contradictory voices, dictates, and feelings fight for control over our inner lives that w...
How we perceive, feel about and respond to people and situations is far more guided by the lessons of early childhood than we would like to believe. We may be adults, chronologically and physically, but too often the youngest parts of our personality...
Sometimes, looking at the many books I have at home, I feel I shall die before I come to the end of them, yet I cannot resist the temptation of buying new books. Whenever I walk into a bookstore and find a book on one of my hobbies — for example, O...
His skin like grey bark, his eyes pale as a winter pool, time and age had worn my father to the bone. In our youth, he’d been a strict master lording over my lessons while tender with the flower of his heart, my sister Anabine. Ana, the lovely, blo...
Impermanence and selflessness are not negative aspect of life, but the very foundation on which life is built. Impermanence is the constant transformation of things. Without impermanence, there can be no life. Selflessness is the interdependent natur...
At the same time, eroticism in the home requires active engagement and willful intent. It is an ongoing resistance to the message that marriage is serious, more work than play; and that passion is for teenagers and the immature. We must unpack our am...
Less than a decade after the Great Exhibition, iron as a structural material was finished—which makes it slightly odd that the most iconic structure of the entire century, about to rise over Paris, was made of that doomed material. I refer of cours...
My only allegiance is to my country. The success of our country is built on hard work, sacrifice, innovation, integrity, and confidence. How can you be confident if you can’t get a job? How can you be confident if the mortgage on your home is...
I work very regular hours, roughly 9 to 5:30. I think I have it much easier than a lot of parents. I just sit at home, I have a very flexible timetable, and I'm very fortunate in that I don't have money problems. I have lunch with my wife at home. I ...
I have heard several people justify working long hours and getting home from work late it night by saying things like, “I have to put in all this time to make up for the vacation we’re going to take this summer.” I bet if I asked your kids, the...
[reporting on shadowing Firefly] Chicolini: Monday we watch-a Firefly's house, but he no come he wasn't home. Tuesday we go to the ball game, but he fool us: he no show up. Wednesday HE go to the ball game, but we fool him, WE no show up. Thursday it...
Mary X: [to the crying baby] Shut up! [Baby continues to cry] Mary X: I can't take it anymore! I'm going home! Henry Spencer: What are you talking about? Mary X: All I need is a decent night's sleep! Henry Spencer: Why don't you just stay home... Mar...
Mrs. Robinson: Benjamin, I am not trying to seduce you. Benjamin: I know that, but please, Mrs. Robinson, this is difficult... Mrs. Robinson: Would you like me to seduce you? Benjamin: What? Mrs. Robinson: Is that what you're trying to tell me? Benja...
Kate McCallister: I have been awake for almost 60 hours. I'm tired and I'm dirty. I have been from Chicago to Paris to Dallas to... where the hell am I? Scranton Ticket Agent: Scranton. Kate McCallister: [finally letting her aggravation out] I am try...
Hilly Holbrook: They carry different diseases than we do. That's why I've drafted the Home Health Sanitation Initiative. Eugenia 'Skeeter' Phelan: The what? Hilly Holbrook: A disease-preventative bill that requires every white home to have a separate...
