Essays + Narratives

I laid face up–a different start to a massage–and felt the warmth of a heated pad beneath me, a soft sheet and cozy blanket above. Those first few minutes, after undressing to my comfort level (down to the beige underwear that is as close as I’ll get to being in the nude) and taking my […]

“My body hurts today.” First waking thoughts as I press my weight into arthritic feet and stand to face the day. This is my body, broken for you. I hobble toward the bathroom each step a reminder  that I am broken, that this body bears the effects of creation, fallen. “I could just fall back […]

I look in the mirror post-shower and catch myself unraveling a story about what this body used to look like. Romanticized memories of sun-kissed skin, firm, fit, petite, and acceptable to the image the world calls “good” threaten to take me down a dead-end road of self-sabotage. Some days these stories win. I take them […]

1. Skin With a wave of my hand— yes, this hand wrapped in wrinkled skinfolds striated with veins like ridges across a mountain range, its ancient beauty splayed for admiring— With a wave of this hand I banish the illusionary elixir, this boastful bottle of serum, a trumped-up mixture of vitamin A1 commingled with vitamin […]

My mother reclines on the sofa, her salt and pepper hair dangling over the armrest. An afternoon soap opera drones in the background, my oversized kindergarten backpack hangs in the closet, and I set up the supplies to play hairdresser: a glass of water, a tortoiseshell barrette, a large claw clip with gold springs, and […]

I return home from my six-week postpartum appointment and stare down the fourth drawer of my dresser. Should I do it?  It’s been more than six months since I shimmied into a pair of jeans—right before everything shut down because of a global pandemic. Since then, I’ve rotated wearing the same two pairs of forgiving […]