The Thing That Wouldn’t Leave

In graduate school, my social life consists almost exclusively of visits to my two best friends, Mel and his wife, … More

An Old Story

The Ring doorbell, with its announcement that “someone is at the door,” always sets Doris off. She’s a good watchdog. I’m very … More

“Make sure to watch the credits all the way to the end.” My friend, Bill Teter, was on his way … More

a distant little door before whichyour message sits, like you, I wonder,waiting. The journey from herewill take an hour, from there … More

On the third morning of the new school year, Chris made it a point to be sitting on the library … More

A manwho has sweated many timesin his fighting careersays blood is only red sweat But nothing hurts morethan a mentorin … More

He’d switched from champagne to beer. He’d disappeared from the reception down in the main ballroom, and I’d decided to … More

I did not recognize Keola. If you’ve not seen someone for, say, 25 years, you might have little difficulty recognizing … More

In my trips to China with my Qi Gong master, I’ve been able to visit places even many Chinese have … More

They weren’t friends. Let’s call them acquaintances. Maybe. They’d done business together for several years, now, and today’s meeting had … More

The two took a table, their old table, in the Coffee Stop. It was one establishment that had survived the worst … More

Here’s to three years of “Let There Be Peace on Earth,”singing for it repeatedly and never seeing even one dayof … More

Termites don’t have hands, I thought, silently cursing my not-so-very amusing friend. Rod, who wasn’t even a licensed exterminator, had … More

It’s been a long, long time since we three got together to drink beer. Each of us says that he … More

Jill and I are hiking Tantalus, and as is her wont, Jill’s decided to be a trailblazer. As we wander farther … More

We five have known each other more than 30 years.Post-pandemic, we meet for coffee, jokingthat we’ve become the senior citizens … More

You surprise me, knocking on my door after 15 years,but I recognize that face behind the mask instantly.The last time … More

Whenever we met, Alan would gift mewith the latest collection of short storieshe’d found while browsing used bookstores. Whenever we … More

If you exist but have no friends, no circle of friends, are you a simply a dot? I was asked … More

We were sitting in her office, and she blew a cloud of smoke into the air above us,her lips positioned … More