Zoom: How do I Look?
Then there’s my hair. Today I put a comb on top to hold back the overgrown front part. I think I’d look better in my zoom square without the comb. How weird will it be if I’m seen arranging my coif?
Then there’s my hair. Today I put a comb on top to hold back the overgrown front part. I think I’d look better in my zoom square without the comb. How weird will it be if I’m seen arranging my coif?
My older sister’s job was rinsing them and mine was loading them schmutz-fee into the dishwasher. My brother’s job was being the only son.
To find out what I’m thinking about, I decided to track my thoughts. But it doesn’t work when your paying attention, like just now I was washing my hands, so for this exercise, I noticed myself saying to myself, “I’m washing my hands.”
“Come here; I just want to talk to you,” she sings in a tone that belies daggers. Two flight attendants are poised by the cabin door, ready, I am certain, to slam it behind me.
biting into a peach at Trader Joe’s and then throwing it away is a freedom I have as a white person, no less one with gray hair and a Medicare card in her fanny pack.
Surveys showed that one in twelve listeners believed the story was real and that Martians were invading New Jersey.
That Greta’s son had set parental controls on his mother’s computer gave me more than just a chuckle; it gave me a jolt, reminding me of the parent-child reversals I had been noticing more and more in my own life.
This of course led me to one of my common ruminations: What would be the cutoff for retrieving a precious item from a public toilet?
How do I measure my dog’s quality of life? A dog whisperer on TV whispered a guideline for when to euthanize your dog: when bad days outnumber good days.
Why do religious people worry? All they have to do is pray. Whenever I’m worried, I have to pay. My therapist is my Lord. The missing laptop was not . . .
Given my name dyslexia, every time I go outside, I have to rehearse all four names beforehand in case I run into any of them.
All this fed into my recurring imaginings of how to celebrate my death, and whether to do so after or before it occurs . . .
Back to another beau, who could say words backwards and so can I, except someone once stumped me in the Say This Backwards game with “onomatopoeia.”
A Washington Story: What if he’s a terrorist? He’ll know where I live. Better to remain inconspicuous.
Does this rah rah for winter months raise questions about my worrywart creds? Should I worry that my upbeat tendencies will discred my worrywart brand?
Most daunting of all, how to sign my book for close friends? A writer ought to be clever, even on short notice.
I never prayed for Steve to win the election, only to keep our sanity intact.
“Susan Orlins is America’s funniest neurotic since Woody Allen. Just be careful you don’t crack a rib reading her memoir, Confessions of a Worrywart.”
I am a fan of Amtrak’s quiet car, yet I harbor love-hate emotions toward the sub-culture of those who journey in this vessel of alleged silence.
Why do we type
The addressee’s address
Above the salutation?
Does he or she
Need this information?
On a Sunday evening in New York I enjoyed a lovely dinner at the Union Square Café with my friend Jessica. I was happy with my pappardelle until two thirds of the way through my meal, at the next table, a waitperson placed in front of a trim young woman …
Do all my awesomes sound like I’m trying to seem young and cool—the language equivalent of someone my age wearing short, short skirts and skimpy tank tops?
When the car’s gas tank gets down to a quarter full, I begin to worry that if there is a terrorist attack, I won’t get very far in my car, so I then make haste to a gas station.
If there’s a heaven,
Will they offer me a key,
Given how mean I was to Barbara Satinsky?
Will Barbara Satinsky forgive and invite me to tea?
I’m sorry, Barbara Satinsky. In 5th grade I had no reason to be a bully. In addition to being one of the leaders of Harum Scarum, the cliquey girls’ handball club, I had kind parents and good friends. So why did I take pleasure in playing a cruel trick on Barbara …
Honestly, I don’t know what I would do without gradual. When my firstborn was an infant, I tried to imagine how I would ever entrust her to a kindergarten teacher.
I’m sitting at the breakfast table in my bra and panties, sipping melted ice water through a straw, pretending it’s iced tea. Casey, sprawled beside me, looks barely alive.
Each Nora Ephron romantic comedy makes the prospect of finding fun, funny romance possible and accessible for everyone.
I check out my perky housewife (minus the wife) reflection, and my mind flashes on memories of mom who was also once middle-aged and active.
At Alcatraz, a former prisoner spoke. He said those who obsessed about getting out “didn’t make it.” Cognitive Therapy would have helped.