Skylar Tea for Two We were walking through the Portland airport on Sunday morning when Skylar burned his hand. His parents had just dropped us off. We hadn't been to Portland to visit his
Louie Boarding School A woman with a paw print tattooed onto her clavicle knocked on my front door on Monday afternoon. She was returning Louie, and I had been anticipating her in urgent
Skylar Humidifier Skylar's bounce in his step was bouncier than usual. I've learned to notice the signs that he's about to do something odd, inconvenient, or expensive. Heightened whistling. A quick pace.
Recipes My Pumpkin Stew In A Pumpkin Recipe None Of You Asked For, Which Was Rude. Recently Skylar told me he thinks Utah has a Halloween fetish. I pressed him on this and he said he's never lived anywhere that takes Halloween as seriously as we
Grandma G-Mac's Hospital Stay Skylar called me a couple of days ago. "So, I just overheard the name of a patient we were admitting and either there are two Darlene McCanns in town or
Skylar A Dire Situation It was in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday when I got a text from Skylar. "I'm sooooo hungryyyyyy" it said. He's been working long shifts at the
Louie Louie's Great Neutering We decided it was time to neuter Louie (dogs don't have very many rights still). We had planned to wait until after his first birthday, which is in one month
Skylar A New Sweater [Announcement: Strangerville Live will is this week, September 16 & 17. You can get tickets and find other info about the storytellers HERE. Please come so we can see how
Essays Coffee It probably wasn’t until I was nearly a teenager that I was even aware of coffee. Sure, I had encountered it before, but I doubt I wondered what it
Skylar Packing [Announcement: Strangerville Live will be September 16 & 17. You can get tickets and find other info about the storytellers HERE. Please come so we can see how cute you
Skylar Emma A couple of years ago Skylar visited his friend Emma in Oakland. This isn't really relevant to this story, but I already need to pause here and let you know
Skylar Coffee Shop I just walked into the coffee shop—the same one where I go every day—to write. But it's hard. I get distracted. Distracted by the same people who are
Work Work From Home I started working from home in 2020. I don't remember why. Something something social distancing. Hard to recall events that long ago. By 2021, a lot of my law firm
Louie Our Monster A handful of dog claws scraped across my face and I could tell marks were already forming. This is how I was awoken from not-a-great sleep, a new daily tradition
Work Change I started law school in 2008, which may have been the worst possible year to start law school. The economic recession had hit the legal market hard, and when it
Travel Ceramic Fish We found it in an art gallery in a small town in southwestern Ireland—a framed ceramic piece featuring small blue fish swimming in a circle. I told Skylar I
EMBARRASSING Tesco We returned from two weeks in Ireland and Northern Ireland last night. It was lovely. We ate potatoes for every meal. Skylar now thinks we are going to name our
Skylar Friends in Ireland We were standing on the side of a street, waiting to cross it, when Skylar was robbed. The culprit was a man in grey sweatpants speeding through a busy thousand-year-old
Essays He's Probably Still Afraid of Seat Belts This piece was reader submitted by Jen Prinster; art by Christopher Patty. Long before high-back booster seats with side impact protection, children were bouncing around in cars like pinball machines.
Skylar King Bed A wet nose pressed into my neck. A moment later I felt the shove of four dog legs against my exhausted body. I inched closer to the edge of the
Guns In 2012 I was living in Palau, in the equatorial pacific, for work. Palau is 17 hours ahead of Utah time, where I was from. I woke up that morning
Skylar Graduation It began at 9:00 and ended three months from now. At least, that's how long graduation felt. I made the mistake—a regrettable misjudgment—to arrive promptly at 9:
Louie Vegas With Puppies Over the years I've had friends tell me that once you start having kids, everything takes ten times longer. No outing is uncomplicated. No activity can ever truly be spontaneous.
Skylar Handyman "I can't find the charger for the drill," the ominous text said without any further explanation. I started typing back. The first word of my text was "why," which I
Skylar What Color Are My Eyes? "What color are my eyes?" Skylar had shut them before he asked me, a measure aimed at preventing me from "cheating." "Dazzling?" My answer was rejected because "that's not a
