Category: Reflections

A Tale of Two Clubs

“At Princeton, joining an eating club is like being a meat-eater: it’s a commonplace practice that has become the norm, but we feel there’s something morally iffy about the whole enterprise.”

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Orange Juice 1989

“Orange-wet fingers and the acid is on her eyes, on her cheeks, running down with the tears and cheap makeup. My father reaches toward her—she is wearing a black silk headband, and he tries to pull it from her hair to wipe her eyes. She yells at him in Greek and he retracts.”

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The Car Bomb Story: On Scaring the Rich, “Maria,” and the Near-Impossibility of Nuanced Storytelling

A reflection in three parts.

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Journal Square

“At the edge of Jersey City is a field of black dirt. For one stretch of the field, two rows of thin, yellow shrubs run along an idle road, planted without any intention for longevity.”

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A Day, and a Shura, in Zaywalat hawza

If you haven’t seen _The Hurt Locker_ yet, don’t. Watch _Groundhog Day_ instead; it’s much better, and it will also give you a far better sense of what the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are like. That’s not an original … Read More

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Confessions VII

Charcoal growths.

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Grandmother’s Cooking

Feels like home, tastes like childhood

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Anna Berghuis

It’s okay, I can’t pronounce it either.

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White Doll, Asian Woman

“But was my femininity forced on me, the only feasible result of a life grown around dolls and children’s books?”

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When Life Gives You Lemons

One of my closest friends called recently after a bad breakup. We hadn’t spoken in a few weeks, so when I picked up the phone, I felt that familiar yet uncomfortable sense of separation caused by more than just physical distance.

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The Rise and Fall of the Tide Pod

“The pods are designed to wash your clothing and maybe even scent them with subtle lavender, not to satisfy an uncontrollable sweet tooth or the adventurous eater in your family.”

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Faith & Identity

On Unitarian Universalism: “Identity is fluid, and its discovery is a personal and communal journey.”

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