I’ve written about divorce — oh, have I! — and a heartbreakingly common message I get in my inbox is something along the lines of, “You don’t know me, but my life is falling apart right now. Thanks for writing about your experiences and making me feel like someday I’m going to be okay.” And [...]
To celebrate my boyfriend’s birthday, I surprised him with boarding passes to a bedroom on a train. Once we had explored our little room and giggled and marveled, I made him wait in the coffin-sized bathroom while I unfurled an entire soiree from my suitcase. I strung white lanterns, draped fancy fabric over the seats, [...]
I kind of grew up in the hood. Sometimes people think I’m exaggerating when I say this, but it’s true. It wasn’t the worst neighborhood in town (that honor went to a place called, appropriately enough, The Bottoms), but some houses didn’t have, you know, front doors.
I always thought this was the creepiest house, [...]
If you like, see also: Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6.
In dating, you’re considering candidates and choosing the best one you can. In job interviews, the exact same thing is happening. But only in the business world are the economics of this endeavor routinely considered.
There’s an anecdote about a [...]
If you like, see also: Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5.
Let’s recap: online dating made me miserable. If I logged on to slog through my messages, that only made things worse—the “Now Online!” flag on my profile would send another deluge of messages from every godforsaken corner of humanity, including some [...]
If you like, see also: Part 1. Part 2. Part 3.
When I decided to return to my hometown for a year to build a roller-derby league, I only really had one social rule: Absolutely No Dating. I had good reason to avoid the dating scene; I had big plans to move to the West Coast [...]
If you’re catching up, see Part 1 and Part 2.
If I knew how we got from there to here, I think I really would write a book about it. But as time has passed, the nights at the rink, the hours of board meetings, the legal paperwork, the radio interviews, and the photo shoots have [...]
Part 1 is here.
A few days after my new roller-derby league’s first practice at the rink, I moved into my new apartment, a decrepit studio roosted atop the tiny row of shops on Main Street. My mother had been right: it was exactly the sort of outdated decor I’d find endearing, complete with hideous linoleum. [...]
So, this one time, in March of 2010, I decided to return to my hometown, after residing for years in a much bigger city, to start a roller-derby league.