“Exile is strangely compelling to think about, but terrible to experience. It is the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home: its essential sadness can never be surmounted. And while it is true that literature and history contain heroic, romantic, glorious, even triumphant episodes in an exile’s life, these are no more than efforts meant to overcome the crippling sorrow of estrangement.” ―Edward W. Said
Read MoreI was cooking breakfast, which is odd since I don’t remember that we usually ate things that were cooked for breakfast, and I could swear neither of us ate eggs. Nevertheless, I was cooking breakfast. He stood in the doorway of the kitchen and said, “I can’t do this anymore.” I thought he meant wait for breakfast, or maybe he had started something handy, and it was backfiring like changing a light bulb or building a wall. “What?” I said, looking up from the frying pan, I remembered that frying pan, so it must have been eggs or bacon or pancakes or French toast.
Read MoreI was telling my friend Janet about my summer job babysitting thirty Brooklyn College freshmen for two months while they studied in London. “Hey,” she said. “Call this guy. He’s a chef in a huge rock recording studio outside of Oxford. You two will love each other.” I took his number despite the fact that I was sure I would never call him.
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