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This is Stan.
And this is his friend Creativity.
Stan loves spending time with Creativity, but unfortunately, he spends much of his week at a job where Creativity doesn’t seem to be allowed.
Stan’s favorite part of the day is when he gets to return home and reunite with Creativity. And, together, they work on making the things Stan finds meaningful and fulfilling.
When Stan returns to work the next morning, he laments the fact that Creativity is nowhere to be found. He wonders why he’s spending 40+ hours a week at a place that seems to be devoid of the thing he cares about most. …
It was Christmas Eve, but it sure didn’t feel like it.
The previous Christmas Eve, I’d watched a midnight Mass outside the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. I suppose it couldn’t get any more “Christmas” than that. But there had been snipers on the rooftops protecting the gathering from an ISIS threat — their eerie silhouettes surrounding Jesus’ supposed birthplace (which I’d recently learned was up for debate). And even without that added touch, the truth was that the Palestinians just didn’t celebrate Christmas like we did at Gramps’ condo in Sacramento.
But I was back with my family for this Christmas. For all intents and purposes, everything was the same as it had been for the past 20 years. The highly anticipated steak and lobster dinner, the jazz, the gilded jesters covering the sizable fake tree, and our polite and tedious present-opening beneath it — they all happened just as planned. Everyone involved, whom I’d missed last Christmas, was still alive and in relatively good health. Nothing had changed. But as I sat alone beside the tree in the fading afterglow of the evening, I realized that I had. …
The following unfolded after about six months of work-from-home pandemic isolation.
I want to die somewhere beautiful, I texted him. That would do the job. I called out of work sick and packed, in five minutes, for anywhere-in-November-USA. I got in the car with my dog, Lupita, and decided to drive until I saw something beautiful enough that was either worthy of dying under, or profound enough to convince me to stay alive. …
Sara Benincasa shares a meditation on wellness, Los Angeles, and shrieking parrots.
When I was six years old my grandmother took my cousin and me to Disneyland. I had been there before, but this time was different. This was a big kid trip. My cousin, seven years older than me, was not interested in “It’s a Small World” or “Dumbo” or “Peter Pan.” She had her own plan for the park: roller coasters.
Not long after making our way down Main Street, we said goodbye to my grandma, who preferred waiting to riding, and headed straight for Space Mountain. I had never been on a roller coaster before and I was terrified. My stomach whirred, my limbs felt floppy, and I wanted to run away every time the line inched forward. …
