Identity
I called a friend who does not identify on the binary gender spectrum “she”, not “they”, and was rightfully called out for it. It was impolite, and politeness is important to me. That is...
Category: Experiences
The Best Hospital Food In the World
I am writing this in my bed in Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital in Manhattan, where the staff are extremely friendly and competent, and I have a gallstone problem that is very routine for...
The Doorstep
Jon was five years young. In those years in England, children of six would walk themselves home from school. But for the first year of school, the front of the school would mill with...
Paradise on Blue Bell Hill
Jeremy and I were brothers, born just short of twelve months apart. From our earliest recollections we had always been together, two against the world. Kids then were free range, and this Easter vacation...
Lunch at Cipriani’s
I get up late, having stayed up very late writing something controversial. Go into Manhattan to pick up my new iPad and keyboard – so excited I am not hungry and skip breakfast, promising...
I Am A Writer
Sitting in my favorite coffee shop, I’m writing my next book. The familiar trappings: my trusty tablet, the colorful cover that doubles as a keyboard. Carefully chosen for a convincing click, the experience of...
The Best Coffee in the World
It was August in the Hula valley, living on a kibbutz in Israel. It was hot. Too damn hot. So hot the Israelis were hot. So hot that I would work late in the...
Citizenship Ceremony
For about ten years while living in the United States I had felt no desire to become an American citizen. I had all the rights of a citizen except the right to vote. And...
Young and Immortal
The Golan Heights is still covered in minefields left by the Syrians before the Israelis captured it in the Six Day War in 1967. We were children at nineteen and twenty, volunteers on a...