When I met and fell in love with my charming, fascinating, creative ex-husband, I never saw the addict. We came together as poet and painter, with great passion for our respective gifts and for each other. It would be six months before I would begin to suspect that this exciting roller coaster ride of joint inspiration and creativity came with “another woman”—Lady Crack Cocaine. ...more

Our parents, in-laws, aunts and uncles are dropping like flies. Rarely two weeks go by without my hearing about someone’s relative finally giving up or giving in and leaving for good. In most cases, this is good. I know how cold and heartless this sounds, but none of us lives forever, and in the great majority of these cases, the soon-to-be-deceased are more than ready to go. ...more

Take a peek into my life—the life of a woman who fell apart, got back up, fell down, got back up again, got knocked down, and remains getting up, never losing her hope, faith, and determination.

I am a 46-year-old African American woman. I was raised in a single-parent household and never met my father. I can’t recall the exact age, but I do know that I was under ten when my adult male cousin molested me. ...more

I walked into the small, overheated, stuffy office for our weekly staff meeting. Andrea, the rector, was there, her gangly body looking uncomfortable on the wooden office chair, her pinched sour face more unpleasant than usual, and her short mousy hair typically unkempt. The light from the window behind her dazzled my eyes, making it hard to look her in the face. To her left sat Frank, ...more

If anyone wondered whether animals grieve… they do.

I am from Boston. I didn’t think I could survive one more New England winter, so five years ago I put my dog in the back seat of my car and drove south. ...more

“I realized while I was away I married you just because I thought you’d make a good officer’s wife. I never loved you. I’m leaving.” ...more

I have two mothers in Japan. One is my real mother. The other is a seventy-four-year-old, wealthy widow who loves to drink whisky and smoke. I don’t remember exactly when I met her, but she and I have kept in touch over the past five years. She was one of my clients in the securities company I worked for as a broker. She and I talked a lot then, not only about investments, but also about our lives ...more

At 12 years old I was in a constant struggle with discipline and how things were supposed to be. I didn’t feel good inside. Everyone said I was bright, but school always meant problems. Poor grades, taking forever to learn, bad attitude, and mouthing off to teachers and coaches. I couldn’t care less. I would lie and cheat if I could get away with it. ...more

1968 was a seminal year in my life and in the lives of many. It was the year I tried hardest to change the political priorities of my country. With my wife’s support, I joined the campaign of Robert F. Kennedy for President. Inspired, I had designed a plan for RFK to capture the delegates of the states that selected its delegates through the convention system. There were 17 such states at the time. Everyone else had been working on the states that ran primaries. I sent the plan to the RFK Think Tank in DC. I didn’t have a name to send it to; I just sent it to the Think Tank office. ...more

Some of the most difficult yet profound experiences of my 65 years transpired during the course of five journeys I made to Africa. Four of them took me to Burkina Faso, where I spent many weeks among the Dagara people in the remote tribal village of Dano, near the border with Ghana. Because of its remoteness, the essential elements of the indigenous world had survived in this area despite some 500 years of European colonization. I went there with a teacher, Malidoma Somé, to immerse myself in the rudiments of that world. ...more