You Stay Inside All Day (Derogatory)
Am I enabling students to become more withdrawn, to become more anxious about engaging with the world outside their computer screen?
Alex Johnson (‘19) is a virtual computer science teacher and a proud resident of Grand Rapids. When she’s not brainstorming the newest project to inflict on her students, she’s cooking semi-vegetarian food, reading too many romance books, and playing rhythm games.
The Memory of a Screen
It is forever in the way that every teenager screenshots a text message to send to a friend in disbelief, in the way that grandmothers download pictures off of Facebook and print them out.
Pawtuckaway O’Clock
4 am to 6 am: Camping’s witching hour.
In Which I Pretend to Design
Maybe scrapbooking is my true calling.
Call for Audition Submissions
Are you interested in joining the post calvin community? We have a few openings for new writers beginning this August, and we’d love for you to audition!
Things My Father Was Right About
As if I was meant to absorb the classics in the womb.
Maybe I Just Can’t Resist Big Shiny Objects
Perhaps the Meijer family is more savvy than I give them credit for.
To London, with Love
You reached your hand out of the ocean of people, standing stock-still in the middle of an intersection while the masses swarmed around you, and I took it.
Figure 1: Chronic Overcommitment Cycle
But then your inbox stays dead. Your calendar remains open.
Santa Hat on a Tree, Nails in the Walls
If I lived alone, my apartment would probably look destitute.
Best of 2022, Part Two: Writers’ Picks
There’s a reason New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day are holidays.
Variations on Messiah
But the Mystery of Love prevailed: God did not say Goodbye or Who Are You but Hey Ya; no Ghost Rule, but God crowned Jesus Lord of the Castle.
To Speak or To Die
How does revealing to them that my mother has died help? What’s the point?
The New York Thruway
The GPS says three hundred miles to the next turn, and the only thing you can do is pop on the next episode of Serial, mentally prepare yourself for the amount of tolls you are going to E-ZPass through, and settle in.
Weird and Awkward and Wonderful
For company, I had my two siblings and other high schoolers from my church with whom I hadn’t exchanged more than a passing word for years due to my aversion to youth group. The food was delicious; the time passed like molasses.
Prayer for the Internet
Be with the internet archivists, continually trying to record an ever-shifting and ever-decaying virtual world.
Where We Will Land
I never thought I would entrench myself deep enough anywhere to forge friendships with people who I don’t want to know my real name or face and whose lives I only have the slightest inkling of.
Leaving Room for Jesus
Don’t you want it so so bad? Aren’t you willing to do the right things so you get to have it? Isn’t not having sex awful?
Call for Audition Submissions
Are you interested in joining the post calvin community? We have a few openings for new writers beginning this August, and we’d love for you to audition!
On the Sinking Ship
Decrying my job seems particularly ironic as a virtual teacher.
The Totally Definitive Kingdom Hearts Tier List
Re:Coded is the unfairly maligned stepsister I will defend with my life.
Lichen and Synths: A Sliver of Trans History
But I’m writing about both, even if they are only connected by gender, because I want you to know them.
P-L-A-N-T
USURP isn’t a very strategic play, but using it makes me feel like a level three English major.
Riddle Me This: What Salamander Are You?
All of these assigned character quizzes are dumb, but I can’t stop taking them.
Best of 2021, Part Three: Editors’ Picks
The cream of the crop, in our humble opinions.
Best of 2021, Part One: Readers’ Picks
You offered up some of the essays that cheered, comforted, and challenged you.
An End, A Continuation
If I retire to my room early, it’s hard not to feel a twinge of guilt.
The Last Car in the Parking Lot
A part of me always knew the place wasn’t the right fit.
Unrecommendation: Music Festivals
Distant bass jars you from Adrianne Lenker’s sweet crooning.
Unmoored
If we’re doing footprints in the sand, I’m wandering into the ocean.
