by Samantha Steiner
It was a weekday, sunny but winter, and I was in my hooded green coat. I approached the subway platform just as a man was leaving, but he wasn’t leaving, he was walking toward me. He had a hand on my arm, stroking the fabric of my coat, and his head leaned too close: a thin face, a deep umber, salt and pepper scruff, eyes that emanated permanent confusion. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
by Cynthia Belmont
I lived in London for half my junior year of college and only spoke to my parents twice. It was the 1980s, before the internet and mobile devices, when you were truly on your own. Overseas calls were expensive, and I enjoyed crafting my life into hand-written letters featuring scenes that amplified its splendor. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
by Maddie Woda
My father says his fifth grade teacher was Guy Fieri’s grandmother. She had red hair and freckles, according to my father, and taught social studies in the trailer duct taped to the actual elementary school. He, my father, and apparently she, Guy Fieri’s grandmother, are both from Powhatan Point, Ohio, a crusty junction of Ohio and West Virginia in the Ohio River Valley. Food is love in Powhatan Point, just like food is love in most places, and my grandmother (not Guy Fieri’s) owned two restaurants while my father was growing up. One was called the Wigwam (I do not debate the politics of this moniker with my father. What’s done is done). The other was called Dorelli’s, manned by Doris and Ellie, my grandmother and great-aunt respectively, before they were my grandmother and great-aunt. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
by Penny Jackson
The reason why my mother had to buy me a bra was because of a letter from our school’s headmaster to the parents of the 7th grade girls. It was noted that many girls who were “maturing” were not wearing the proper undergarments. Teachers would now routinely check each girl who came to the school by tracing a finger down their backs. If the necessary “item” was not worn, the girl could be sent home. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
by Virginia Watts
You are either born afraid of horses or you aren’t. I tried to pretend I wasn’t afraid of them the summer I was fourteen. Blame the recent television coverage of the equestrian events on the Olympic games in living color. Female riders like string beans. Absolutely no hips. Just slinky. Gorgeous, oiled leather boots molded to their calves. How did they get those boots on and off? Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
Hawaii Pacific Review 