• The Other Me

    The Other Me

    ‘Life’s Short Interruption: Part II’ ii. The end didn’t come with Allie. Not then, when I thought it was imminent. She changed – not drastically, nor permanently, but for long enough to convince me that the real Allie was still in there, although maybe that itself was just the nurture of a forlorn hope. You get in relationships, especially long-term relationships, and you put your faith in them and that they’ll work out, even when all the indicators suggest otherwise. If they were a stock, your broker would advise – given the signs – that you should dump it. But you don’t. You ride it to the crash. Allie remained…

  • The Other Me

    The Other Me

    ‘Life’s Short Interruption: Part II’ i. Once I was back at school, all the fears and awkwardness of twenty years earlier returned, as well as the embarrassment of sharing what little I’d done with my life. There were other mature-age students, but I was so far behind them and where I should’ve been. The exception was the world of writing, where I’d learned about writing, revision, and submitting. In that regard I became somebody to look up to. It didn’t seem very much. The social phobias of being in school also scared me. Whenever we had to partner-up for assignments, I’d sit mute. During breaks, I found it near-impossible to…