Stories

400 Words content. True personal stories that might or might not also appear in the print magazine.

400 Words by Albert Maysles

Posted to Stories on the topic of Autobiographies on 1 December 2008, with 4 comments so far.

Of all the interesting things that have happened to me by chance in New York, one of my most valued is the evening I met Albert Maysles, by chance, at a cocktail party. I wasn’t expecting to know a single person there besides the person who’d taken me, and I didn’t, so I was pleased […]

Things I Wanted to Be

Posted to Stories on the topic of Work on 31 October 2008, with 4 comments so far.

by Katherine—Age 29—New York City
The embarrassing, complete list:
Kindergarten:
Great artist. Great philosopher. Write treatises about things. Composer (later realized do not comprehend music)
Second grade:
Scientist, like Louis Pasteur or Marie Curie (classroom had book nook with career series); Margaret Mead (did not totally understand what she’d done, but liked her style as represented in book-nook career books); […]

Work

Posted to Work on 23 September 2008, with 3 comments so far.

Last year, I wrote two takes of my own on work for the ‘work’ issue. I’ll post them here on consecutive days. —ed.

by Katherine—Age 28—New York City
Like most Americans, I wanted to get rich quick. This was around age eight or nine; I bursted with schemes, like starting a henhouse in our suburban backyard and […]

Bridge

Posted to Stories on the topic of Breakups on 6 August 2008, with 3 comments so far.

by Mark—Age 30—Astoria, OR
The bridge I see from my window rises quickly from Oregon and crosses a river so wide it could be confused for the ocean it feeds.
Bridges occupy a piece of real estate in Sarah’s brain. She’ll spot them on trips and make me pull over. Covered bridges, short steel trussed spans bridging […]