There Is No Safety
The very hard thing I am learning right now—about race, and about myself—is that the rules I have been living by are not very good ones.
Katie is a doctoral student in English and education at the University of Michigan. She loves the New York Times crossword puzzle, advice columns, oceans, and dogs of all kinds.
Ten Astonishing Books by Black Writers
This is not an anti-racist reading list, per se.
Curiosity and Moral Courage, or, a Commencement Address for Uncertain Times
Moral courage and curiosity means listening to yourself: where did this idea come from? Why am I moved to defend it?
My Best Friend Lives in New York
But I will say that—for me—being confined to my home has sometimes felt liberating in a small and quiet way.
“Trying Experience,” 6 Letters –
It’s tempting, as the writer, to make a trite connection here to challenges I have previously risen to (a potentially boring speech about crossword puzzles).
Seeing Red
I feel like I was sold a story of America, and a story of my people and who we were, and it turns out that it was mostly a lie,
Prayers of the People
Each week during the prayers of the people I make a mental inventory: do I know anyone who is ill? Anyone who is grieving? Anyone job-searching, traveling, celebrating?
Holiday Fluff
It’s hardly the holidays without it.
Morning Poems
I was tired. I was also tired of myself. So I started class with a poem.
W is for Work
But I am not paid for caring about my job.
My Best Advice
I spend a fair bit of time with first year college students. I am sometimes envious of them.
Blessed Because
I suspect that we sometimes use the language of blessing as a neat way to sidestep the questions those things raise.
Nothing But Cheese
We got a dog.
Behold, I am an American
Perhaps it was outside of Ottawa, where yet another AirBNB featured a drip coffee maker but no filters or beans.
What’s Coming
Why would I give up my dog?
Katie and Brenna’s Not-So-Definitive, Entirely Anecdotal Guide to Online Dating
It is so hard, in the midst of it, to see online dating as anything other than a means to an end—but it became much more palatable for me once I began to understand it as a life stage in its own right.
On Having “Guy Friends”
It’s unclear to me, still, how much of this was based in an adolescent desire for male approval.
Putting My Underwear on Backwards
Perhaps my first mistake was expecting that I would ever entirely grow out of it.
Are You The One?
“I just need to know if it’s worth hoping,” we say. “Is this guy the One or not?”
Heaven, Like Mario Kart
The trouble was, though, that when I tried to imagine the stream of gold going on forever, my head would begin to thrum.
Everything Really Matters, A Lot
B: I think that it might be important to take a minute and savor the fact that you no longer actively think you’re terrible
Home Improvement
Five bags of MAPEI Self Leveler Plus Indoor Self-Leveling Underlayment later, our living room is rather more level than it was before.
Just a House
I was suddenly aware of everything: the squelch of the slider door’s rubber seal releasing as my brother came in from the yard. The creak and crash of the screen door to the garage behind my dad.
I Bought a Wetsuit and It Was a Full Body Experience
I am not sure how to accurately convey the unpleasantness of this experience. There was no part of my body that went gentle into that good night.
Congratulations on What Matters
I remember my high school’s Friday morning chapel as uninspiring, but it seemed like everyone wanted to take part in the Class of 2010’s “senior chapel.”
Light from Light
I didn’t know how to write about a rain jacket on Palm Sunday after forty-four people died in their churches.
City Stories: Life on the Road
Stories of travel compel us, she says, because “more reliably than anything else on earth, the road will force you to live in the present.”
Nothing Goes as Planned
Last fall, my much-delayed Megabus dropped me off in Chinatown at 2:30 a.m. I had seven percent battery life, four dollars in cash, and no idea how to get to Brooklyn.
Martha, Martha
Well, shit, Jesus.
Dystopia Now
But Nathan was right. I can’t plan for the apocalypse. I can only do what I believe to be useful and good now. I can only do what is in front of me.
