Category: goodbye
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Summers at the Lake: Why We Talk About Leaving
It seems we ask about plans for leaving mid-bend and swing on the summer’s first cannonball off the wooden dock. We’re handing over the SPF30, Can you get my back?, and it has yet to soak in before we ask, And when are you leaving?, condensation barely pooling on our defrosting cans in the North…
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There Are Things I Need to Tell You
My waiter, he asked how old I was in reference to the round of margaritas for the table of guac lovers, and so I replied, “27.” My friends, they turned to me quickly and corrected, “Ash, you are 28.”
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My view from under these covers.
Today, I woke up at 4 a.m. with a fever, that Heat Miser yet Snow Miser feeling of crawling out of your own skin where you trip over everything in the dark just to make it to the bottle of Motrin. I knew right away what was happening: this is my autoimmune body saying, Please, I am…
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Let me live that fantasy.
The floor of my shower felt cold when I first sat down, until the warm water and my warm body made it tolerable. Over these last couple years, I’ve learned how to take hot and long showers. Nothing about it is good for my precious planet, I get that. But, honestly, it’s my rookie attempt at…
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The art of inbox refreshing.
I am currently waiting on answers to approximately 18 prayers. I’ve been in these monumental moments of transition before, but this one just feels a lot like a root-canal election season when, for better or for worse, we know that eventually it must end and someone has to win. These 18 prayers fit into just about every…
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On saying goodbye.
Dear Leaving, I don’t want you to go. When I wake up, you’ll be gone. I’ll cry over the pot of coffee because you won’t be here to drink a cup of dark roast. I’ll miss you. I love you. Do you have to go? Love, Crying. Dear Crying, Saying goodbye is all about the…
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What to Say to the Elderly Woman About “Home”
She looked at me, tears welling up to the brim, about to overflow, and she said, “I just want to go home, but I can’t get back there.” “Well, where is home?” I asked. “New England,” she said, her eyes gleaming with delight at just the name of this magical land. “I still call it…
Ashley Fenker 