Bread and Bread

1. a child’s garden of viruses I grew up hearing stories of sickly children who’d grown up to be famous writers. Unable to leave the house due to vague and romantic illnesses, they read and reread classic literature, hardbound books strewn about them on fluffy Victorian linens. Perhaps they would pause to gaze out at the lonely moors now and then. I also liked the sick kids in books. I never wanted to be rambunctious Laura Ingalls or frolicking Heidi or sassy Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden . I wanted to be blind, well-behaved Mary Ingalls, or Clara in her antique wheelchair, or pale weak Colin. It’s easy to see why I romanticized illness and disability—these kids got to be mysterious and special, while being forgiven any shortcomings. I actually was like the talkative, mildly troublemaking protagonists—the Lauras and Heidis—who tried adults’ patience with their busy imaginations, and therefore I was totally uninterested in them. They were always picnicking with bread a...

Who needs perfect teeth when you have a bedazzled face? I started this blog almost exactly seven years ago. I’m sure I have at least seven more years worth of posts in me about movies, books, babies, Taco Bell radio commercials and other pressing matters. But I think it’s time for a hiatus—probably somewhere in the network sitcom range, not the HBO range, length-wise. I’ve been thinking about living my life in public—something I started doing accidentally as a result of being a writer, an all-too-willing Facebook addict and someone who generally can’t shut up. As much as this blog is not a diary (my actual diary sounds like the most boring therapy session in the world), constantly documenting my life in any capacity has created a weird obsession with presentation. It’s like I visit my blog or my Facebook page to find out what I’m like. The places I need to visit are church, my friends’ houses, my therapist’s office. Maybe some poetic mountain or freeway underpass (depending wh...