Archive for April 2007

Cool Site Alert*: Brevity

Posted to 400 Words News on 24 April 2007, with 3 comments so far.

Edited by the mysteriously-named Dinty W. Moore, Brevity is an online journal of ultra-short (that’s 750 words or less, to you) nonfiction essays.

Brevity publishes in ‘issues’ rather than ongoingly; Issue 23 is up now. It’s the literary equivalent of a small Whitman’s sampler, ten delectable non-fictive morsels by ten interesting people I want to know […]

Private Practice Therapist

Posted to Stories on the topic of Work on 23 April 2007, with 4 comments so far.

by Caryn—Age 53—Carbondale, CO
Some cry within the first few minutes; others never can, even after a year.
The same losses make them cry but it is how they cry that defines them.
The pain is a given.
One mother cries into her hands as if to catch rain in a cup. Another shrugs, smiles hard, then sobs. An […]

Bus Boy

Posted to Stories on the topic of Work on 21 April 2007, with 1 comment so far.

by Kendra—Age 24—Kansas City, MO
My title was GM—General Maintenance. That’s Bus Boy in layman’s terms. It doesn’t matter how you try and spin that, I was at the very bottom. This acceptance will later explain how I managed to do something that even now, I can’t believe.
At 16, cleaning up after Mexican restaurant-going families seemed […]

Summer Maintenance Worker

Posted to Stories on the topic of Work on 19 April 2007, with 1 comment so far.

by Henry Stimpson—Age 57—Wayland, MA
Billy told us right away he was the boss of our crew of high-school boys raking up city parks and playgrounds for the summer. “You do what I tell you to.” He had a dirty-blonde ducktail, tight black jeans, pointy boots and wiry arms.
Our real boss, John, was a stumpy […]