Red's Wrap
Happiness. It's relative.
Tag: disability
One Last Word
By the end of today, I wanted to duct tape shut the mouths of the people I was with so they could not utter another single syllable. It was okay if their bodies were littered about my house and also okay if they talked… Continue Reading “One Last Word”
Green Light
The blind lead the blind for a reason, I guess. They go where they need to go even if they can’t see where that is. In the time it took for the light to change from red to green, the slim woman with the… Continue Reading “Green Light”
A Week of Shorts: In the TSA Line
He was a tall guy, older, hefty, wearing khaki pants and a baseball cap. She was small and so thin and spare that it looked like someone had dressed a Halloween skeleton in jeans and a plaid shirt for fun, cinching a leather belt… Continue Reading “A Week of Shorts: In the TSA Line”
Footnote to “At the Breakfast Bar”
Most things I write are true but this one essay is one of the truest things I’ve ever written. I just describe what happened in a chance encounter at a hotel breakfast bar with a man in a wheelchair and it is as plain… Continue Reading “Footnote to “At the Breakfast Bar””
Swivel Chair
My old tax returns made me sad. I looked at my business income, held that year’s wad of 1099’s from clients, and then fed each year’s tax return into the shredder. One can’t make a scrap book out of financial records, after all, so they… Continue Reading “Swivel Chair”
Pulling
We watched the middle weight horse pull today at the Wisconsin State Fair. Two-horse teams pull a truck loaded with heavy weights. When we left, the weight was 3,250 pounds aiming for 4,000 before the event was over. The horses strain and pull, sometimes… Continue Reading “Pulling”
Green Light
The blind lead the blind for a reason, I guess. They go where they need to go even if they can’t see where that is. In the time it took for the light to change from red to green, the slim woman with the… Continue Reading “Green Light”
Return
Disability depresses. It struck me today how deeply I sank into a chronic state of melancholia over the past few years. My ever-worsening hearing disability ate away at my optimism and tested my ability to right myself. I became an Emily Dickenson figure in blue jeans,… Continue Reading “Return”
Pull the Wings Off Butterflies
If I was Donald Trump’s mother and I witnessed him jerking his arms in the air in mockery of New York Times reporter Serge Koveleski, I would have slapped him across the face. In front of God and everybody. Never mind that he is… Continue Reading “Pull the Wings Off Butterflies”
Snow Door | wisconsinacademy.org
Listen to Jan read her essay “Billy” presented on WUWM’s Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “At the Breakfast Bar” on WUWM Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “The Parish Hall,” on WUWM Lake Effect
“Fury Cannot Touch Me,” Modern Love, NYT, 9/29/11
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