What Brotherhood Means to an Only Child
I’ve often been surprised by how people react when they discover I’m an only child. There’s usually an initial shock, the revelation that I’m more visibly well-adjusted than the stereotypical one. Then, a frown forms as they discern my childhood must have been rather lonely. Where I was lacking in friends, or brothers, I made up for with superheroes. After a long day of school, when other kids were roughhousing with their siblings, I was reading the adventures of the Hulk or the X-Men.
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Can You DIY a Family?
My father is a narcissist. That’s the simplest way to put it, though it took me years to reach that conclusion—a conclusion the rest of my family still struggles to accept…
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The Waiting Room
In the least deranged way possible, I’m a people watcher—have been since I was a child. I enjoy looking through townhouse windows and listening to dinner conversations. I’m by no means doing it to be creepy, in my mind, it’s an anthropological study into the lives of people around me. An innate trait I use to connect to and understand the world.
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Confessions from a Sorta-Untalented Semi-Ex Theater Kid
According to my silver 2010 Acura, I’ve starred in 32 one-woman shows. I’ve won a Tony Award for “Best Performance of Maureen Johnson at a Dunkin’ Drive-Thru.” To its knowledge, I’m a famous Broadway star, selling out shows every night. In reality, I’m your average 20-year-old college student just trying to get to her job at the local Kumon.
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My Dad's Spaghetti
While studying abroad, there were moments when I couldn’t appreciate what was happening around me. I’d ask, “Why me?” At first, the question wasn’t loud, barely audible inside my own mind, and I was happy. After all, when would I ever be 19 years old in Paris during the Olympics again? Never. So it would be best if I were to just shove that question into the darkest closet of my mind.
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Preschool on 5th Avenue
I’ve seen these trees grow and change, adjusting to the world around them. Their roots bubble up, seeping through the cracks of the concrete which once laid flat. I watch as a group of four-year-olds pour out of the preschool building's doors. Suddenly, my eyes blur and I escape into a memory of when I was small and mighty too.
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You Can Be Anything...Just Not President
As a child I assumed the president was a woman—it never even occurred to me that a man would be capable of doing the job. In my little 5-year-old brain, it was women’s work. On the brink of the 2008 election, I had to be told the leader of your country was a man. I was extremely confused, because according to the shelves of Target, Barbie was the president-elect. This had to mean the actual leader must be female right?
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Breaking Out of the Box
If my ninth-grade self could see me now, she’d be rolling her eyes, utterly confused, asking one question: why do I not look gay? When I was in high school, I wore my sexuality on my sleeve. I unabashedly had bright red hair, giant winged eyeliner, and wore massive platform boots at 8 o’clock on a Monday morning. Now, it’s a miracle if I can get myself to put my contacts in instead of throwing on my crooked glasses. So I wonder: Has my laziness left me looking straight?
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Bananas, Bananas, Bananas
"Bananas, bananas, bananas.” I’m a sensitive person. The smallest thing can break my heart. If I let myself, I’ll cry for hours. But somehow, along the way, I’ve created a hard, emotionless persona for myself. After 20 years, there’s no going back, so I gnaw on my tongue and think about bananas.
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Dear Ed: A Letter To My Eating Disorder
When you saw me for the first time, I was 12 years old, and I fell because you pushed and pulled, then pulled and pushed. Your desire made me feel seen, worth being counted, so I stepped aside, let you in, and we have lived together since. Though I was wrong about you then: I was nothing but another door for you to force open when one of your doors had slammed close.
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Flashes of Home
My bed is my pride and joy. If you see me anywhere, I’d rather be there, lying in my field of flowers, under the stars—the fairy lights that I’ve had since 2020. It sits in the corner and acts like a throne for a queen who must watch all her subjects at every hour.
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Halloween Blackout
The human brain is the most complex organ in the human body for scientists to understand and, in turn, treat. While there are over 600 neurological diseases, I particularly want to dive into the complexity of epilepsy. My neurologist said I had to accept that every time I went to bed… “You may not wake up.”
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MS, Myself And I
“Multiple Sclerosis,” he stated, in a tone that was more matter of fact than sympathetic. He didn’t care to explain what that entailed, but took the liberty of giving me time to Google it myself. When he came back into the room he asked if I had any questions. I only had one. “Could someone get the needle out of my arm?”
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What They Don't Tell You About Group Therapy
In our most vulnerable moments, we seek community. We desire the listening ears of others, their comforting eyes and soft hands welcoming our embrace. Until we don’t. Until we’re faced with two words that send shivers down the spine of a brooding teenager: group therapy.
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I Don’t Know How To Say Goodbye, But I Can Try
Somehow, a group of people I met six weeks prior changed my definition of home. They flipped it upside down, shook it around, rearranged it, rotated it ninety degrees. It was awful and wonderful and exciting and nerve-wracking and everything in between. I wouldn't want it any other way.
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The Heart Of The T
It’s no secret that the T hosts Boston’s best cast of characters. And while some of those characters can be off-putting, others are some of the nicest people I have ever met. I can count on my fellow T riders.
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Farewell Florida, So Long Boston, Goodbye America
The only thing worse than Florida is being from Florida. Since my escape to Boston, whenever I tell people my home state, I’m met with concerned faces, the pitiful “You poor thing,” or people literally backing away from me in fear. I use “escape” not as a hyperbole.
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Me And My Kodak Against The Clock
This unwavering sense of dread sparked a need to start capturing everything. Sure, there’s virtue in letting things live in your memories, but I was freaking out about time passing and developing an increased sense of sentimentality in the process. So, this past Christmas, the only gift I wanted was a digital camera.
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What’s the Harm of a Little Body Checking, Right?
Girls will have their partners try to wrap one arm around their waist and drink a cup of water, and there are challenges to see how small one can get when they tighten a corset. These trending videos are starting to dominate social media. Many don’t think a simple video on the internet can cause that much harm, but it can.
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Men And Their Beards
I see my dad twice a year. The last time I saw him feels like the kind of memory one associates with a photo—stagnant, an anecdote. We sat in a coffee shop in Boston at a small round table for an hour, sipping on coffee. It was brief. This time, jumping out of his car, he greeted me with a tight, bony hug at the North Carolina airport.
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