How midlife loosened my tongue — When I flipped off the speeding truck, I knew things had changed. Sending a hearty “fuck you” to a stranger was a thing I had almost never considered before, but in the moment, it seemed oddly, perfectly natural. I briefly reconsidered the wisdom of this change when he doubled back…

I ate a gummy and it was a ride — The gummy cubes are tiny, about half the size of a standard sugar cube, and they’re pleasingly packaged in an adorable tin. The accompanying literature suggests I drop them in tea, coffee, or cocktails. Just like sugar cubes. They’re flavored — “like those hot cinnamon candies,” say the people who…

A response to India Knight’s bad take — On Mother’s Day Sunday, the Times UK published India Knight’s column entitled, “Can we just cool it with this menopause mania?” Oh my god where to start. Here’s a quote: “ … mostly I know women who just accepted the menopause as a minor and temporary inconvenience, joked about it…

Life is pain — My back hurts. It’s because I’m an aging biped, according to almost everything, but it’s also because of the long car ride. Given that I continue to age and will hopefully be walking on two feet for the foreseeable future, there’s not much relief in sight. It seems like a…

Seeking new language for midlife — Depending on your source, there are 34 symptoms of menopause. Or 36. Or maybe 66 symptoms. And there are 9 “unusual” symptoms, all of which I found usual. I am thankfully on the far side of the worst of it, but my peri/meno experience was a long and often brutal…

And I started a Substack! — I have the same modern problem that all voracious readers seem to have these days — too many newsletters. So many subscriptions, I’m buried in reading. The inbox is always full. I’ve tried to trim the list, but most of them are so good I’ve just resigned myself to daily…

Some questions — Writers are always going on about the WIP. The “Work in Progress.” The bun in the oven, the bulb in the ground. They are always pregnant with possibility, the result like an oasis in the distant, golden future. Many of them are actually working, I imagine. …

When grace finds you, she will crack you open. If only just a little, enough to let the dark seep out. It will be such a small thing, but it will matter. She found me at the wheel of my car, traveling from here to who-knows-where, in the throes of…

Escape from a plague reality — Since the pandemic sent us home and slowed us down, reality has been reduced to the four familiar walls. I, however, have discovered digital rooms and now reality has some stiff competition. I’m not sure if this was in my life’s original script, or if it’s a sad development of…