Dear Jack
A father writes his son a note on election night. It gets passed around their family and friends—and soon the entire world. What viral impact looks like, post-Trump.
personalessays
A collection of 230 issues
Dribbling in the Dark
What it’s like to be 14 in a new school, a new city away from home—and the wrong ethnicity in a divided country.
Powerlifter
Traditionally ostracized in the weight room, women who dare to lift weights discover strength they were previously denied.
Dark Waters
Some of the world’s largest, oldest fish live in Oregon. Why anyone would want to vandalize them, even abduct them, takes explaining.
Being John
When five million people share your name, your Google-ability is miserably low. Will this forever change naming?
This Bird’s Life
Leave the pardoning to the president. For one budding farmer, some truths are self-evident: that turkeys are stupid, dirty, and very mean.
Dirty Words
Throwing f-bombs may be offensive to some people, but it's also one of the greatest mental health regimens ever devised.
The Last Dying Cat
When the family pet nears the end, of course there is sadness. But there is also every other emotion.
Life Before Death
If you had to choose between the life of a loved one or the survival of a dozen other people, would you be capable of a rational decision?
Honeymoon Sandy
A Manhattan wedding, a cancer scan, and the largest Atlantic hurricane ever recorded.
The Writing of Art
Protesters are clashing in the street over paintings. What is it, whether in art or literature, that makes one thing better than another?
Crimewatcher
The victim of a robbery starts attending trials in New Orleans to understand the system while her burglar serves time in jail. Then he gets out.
Mrs. Bundy
For the mother of a serial killer, a chance to connect with victims on live TV offers a shot at redemption.
Our Imaginary Brother Only Watches PBS
How one family schemed to be the best TV-watchers in America.
The Slaughter
To produce food in the form of meat, an animal will be killed. Obvious but significant: You will realize you are about to end a life.
The Low Road
Not everyone who breaks your heart is a monster. And not everyone who wounds you deserves to be wounded in return.
Paper Citizen
America is a proud nation of immigrants—try telling that to everyone on the other side of the door. Life as a white-collar undocumented immigrant in New York.
The Problem of the Flying Puppies
Catfishing is usually part of an online romance scam—not the world of expensive French bulldogs.
Silicon Valley High
No one’s surprised in Silicon Valley when a 12-year-old runs the family e-commerce store. But going to the same high school as Steve Jobs and liking it are two different things.
The View From Up Here
Class isn’t supposed to exist in America, unless it’s overcome. But the art of being upwardly mobile doesn’t always come easy.
Everything's Amazing and Nobody's Happy
Before he was America's favorite philosopher comic, he was just another comedian out on tour. And she was the journalist he wanted to meet.
Home Sweet Sweden
In a life of perpetual movement, the moment arrives when you find yourself desperate for stillness.
My Time of Not Dying
Call it Kreider’s Law: You can’t be grateful to be alive your entire life. Especially when there's an arms race going on inside your head.
All Happy Couples Are Alike
Better to have loved and lost—and best to have written an essay about it. Surviving the Russian melodrama of young love.
Editors’ Favorites From 2014
The staff choose their most-liked pieces published in 2014: a painting expedition through the Underground Railroad, a personal memory of Vivian Maier, and a restaurant review that isn’t a restaurant review.
The Retreat
How to spend a holiday alone and not get lonely, with adventures in BBQ, books, rummage shops, and cabin porn.
The Long Play
A marriage in the digital era begins with an invitation to listen to a record. Rediscovering vinyl, sonic memories, and the joy of sitting down to do one single thing.
Terrapin Station
All the magic of the Mojave Desert, or the Amazon rainforest, can be found in the salt marshes of New Jersey.
The Medium
Talking about language is already tough. Try discussing a brand new language via Skype with two hearing linguists, plus another via text, who happens to be deaf, and see what you learn.
Radio Maria
A new series where we ask a novelist to eat in a restaurant, then write us something that meets two criteria: 1) it is a restaurant review; 2) it is not a restaurant review.
Mating Habits of the Asterisk
Living out of a van, without an address to pin you down, can be blissful and carefree, and occasionally miserable. But the same goes for love.
Dear Daughter, Your Mom
Drawing inspiration from those who went before, and those still to come, in the waitress wars.
Girl With the Old English Tattoo
A court order is found buried in a desk. A private detective is hired. But tracking down a doppelgänger is not the same as confronting one.
Game Face
Even someone who writes erotica for a living has to find ways to get through moments of shame.
A Country’s Width
Years go by easier when there are 2,000 miles separating a father and son. Then an American flag turns up in your lap.
The Cello Courier
After a death in the family, a precious musical instrument must be transported a thousand-plus miles. Should it break, a lot more is at stake than just music.
Crime Reported
Lawbreaking occurs, a man calls for help, the police detain an endless lineup of men. Sometimes fraud comes as no surprise.
Chrissy Smoked
Twice a year, a group of friends gathered in a coal-mining pocket of Pennsylvania—friends in their twenties with fragile identities, who didn’t know yet what would happen.
The Illuminated
A family that relies on the satisfactions of the logical—calculus, physics, chemistry—finds itself haunted by ghosts.
A Man Enough
Eventually a man who’s always in motion, always fixing something, will stop. Decline of the patriarch reveals an entire family’s vulnerability.
Tale of the Transcription Tape
Sometimes a love scene calls for [WHIMPERS], sometimes it needs [YELPS], but knowing which one to use makes all the difference. The secret life of a professional closed captioner.
Grandpa
Passing the summer days in North Carolina’s low country often meant sitting on the porch with Grandpa and his radio. Today, it doesn’t take much to go back there.
Editors' Favorites From 2013
The staff choose their most-liked pieces published in 2013: a trip to Patsy Cline's divided hometown, the complete biography of North West, a cold case of hit-and-run, and no shortage of great quotes about dead bodies.
Born, Still
A newborn wavers between life and something else. For the father, a walk in the woods elucidates the struggle between nature and nurture.
A Lifetime’s One Regret
Does hindsight improve with age? People, ages five to 60, name their life's biggest mistake and what they learned.
The Cause of All the Commotion
This Saturday, the 2013 hurricane season will end—and with it, possibly, New York City’s final hurricane-less year.
Where the Himalayan Moss Grows
Going on a five-day cleanse—subsisting on a diet of shots, smoothies, very few actual foods, and no caffeine—leads to visions of apocalypse. From 2013, a quest to find the seven billionth child on Earth.
Once Upon a Time in the Middle East
Driving from Lebanon toward Syria, across the Saudi Arabian desert to Dammam, in a taxi among the refugees of Beirut—quickly becomes the Wild West.
Songs in the Key of Eno
Much to the chagrin of his former 25-year-old self, a man in his forties—with no singing experience outside the shower—joins the village chorus. Terror, learning, and intense joy, all while making Brian Eno proud.
Mother, May I
Don’t let the flying matzoh balls confuse you. A visit from a dead parent is serious business—a second chance for love, and for forgiveness.
The Moroccan Deception
A man follows his grandparents’ trek to Morocco—where the Alaouite Dynasty has ruled since 1666—to search for so-called “sacred music” amid a feedback loop of riots, arrests, and the promise of miracles.
Cicadian Rhythms
Should the cicadas arrive just in time for your wedding—biblical, unexpected, and yet, routine as clockwork—there’s nothing to do but carry on with the ceremony. Come hell or, in fact, high water.
Flood-Tide Below Me
Seeking respite from a life lived in war zones—too many rebel factions, too many gunshots, too many backfiring motorcycles that sounded like gunshots—a family discovers temporary shelter in the outer edges of New York City. And then, the deluge.
The Real Me
The internet is an unrelenting enabler of our flaws and an unforgiving archive of them—so should you google your new love interest, or hold off? And what if they google you first?
Start of Darkness
The world of the myope is often a nicer place—faces lack wrinkles, and trees seem to be painted by Monet. Then, during a visit to Moscow, a black spot appears.
Night Vision
An unexpected pregnancy, tuna sandwiches consumed in darkness, and woman after woman of a certain age living by the ocean—eventually, all connections make sense when it comes to prescient grandparents.
Pause, Panic, Gringo
When your name prompts questions in several continents, how you answer—and whether or not you stick an accent above the “a”—says a lot about who you are.
Hiss and Hers
When you fall for someone, you fall for everything that comes with them: their beliefs, their passions, and American history’s most infamous typewriter.
I Wish That We Could Both Be There
In 1974, a car hits a seven-year-old boy in central New Jersey. The boy dies. From 2013, a former friend starts to probe the causes, effects, statistics, and consequences.
Begin the Descend
Hebrew has a verb to describe the act of a Jew immigrating to Israel: la'ahloht, “to ascend.” Upon deciding to leave Israel, our correspondent starts the slow process of descent well before boarding the plane.
It’s All in Your Head
It begins as a dull ache, then the skull becomes hot and brittle, then the neck stiffens—and then there’s no escaping a migraine. A search for relief, temporary or otherwise.
Giving Up the Guns
When your life is opened in front of you, all your old attachments shucked off, the task of finding a new ending can be as simple as handing over a bag of guns.
Hey, Bear
The great American wilderness is home to hungry stomachs, including some that reside in animals weighing 600 pounds more than you.
The Perfect Forecast
Predicting the weather is an incredibly complicated task. Stopping it altogether is even more difficult—but that doesn't mean scientists aren't trying. Obsession, cloud seeding, and very powerful storms.
Under the Bridge Downtown
When you’re a competition-level grocery-store bagger, it’s easy to overlook the messy lives of your co-workers. But when one of them goes missing, and you start to grow up, the picture changes.
Learning to Talk
When a voiceover artist temporarily loses the use of her primary asset, the struggle back to speaking unearths what’s gone unsaid for too long.
The Wolf Is Waiting
Imperceptibly and without warning, your pulse accelerates, your mind races, and panic grips your body—for anxiety attack sufferers, every day is a case in survival. A journey to the wild to confront the fear.
Tiny Castles of Doom
Read between the lines of a to-do list, and you'll find an artfully constructed maze of excuses. A challenge to complete five things before the end of summer, or before you die—whichever comes first.
I Believe I Speak for All of Us
Being overseas, the traveler is often taken for a diplomat—to explain his native country’s strange ways and beliefs. For example, why do all Americans belong to cults? What does Michelle Pfeiffer eat for breakfast? And why so many guns?
The Storm Comes Around
Tornado season is a distant concept for most people. For some, it’s a scary but known part of life. Then there’s what happens when one of the South’s deadliest storms in history destroys your house.
The Art of Choking
Some people require the Heimlich Maneuver a bit more than the rest of us. A report on the four times—so far—that the author has relied on the assistance of others.
What I Didn’t Write About When I Wrote About Quitting Facebook
The emergence of the Social Media Exile essay has been swift and smug. A language expert dissects a genre while also being seduced by its allure.
The Man Who Loved to Have Coffee With Women
From playing with childhood friends to sharing tips with other new parents, the author concedes he just gets along better with girls.
The Secret Point of Money and Power
Over time, a couple shares a bed, a past, and money. But when the relationship ends, as accounts are counted and paid, some debts are more complicated than they seem.
Photo Finish
Running into your father on the internet can be a startling event when it’s unexpected. Particularly when your father is dead.
Ghosthunter
In the Port-au-Prince neighborhoods of Turgeau, Bois Verna, and Pacot exist 300 "gingerbread houses"—derelict and endangered, never mind scary. Still, a good old-fashioned ghost story takes some looking for. Until it comes to find you.
Shorty
When you were a toddler, doctors told your parents you had a "failure to thrive." Which means: You're small, and you're going to be short. Later, when medication helps you grow faster than you’ve ever grown before, the hardest part may be deciding when to stop.
Nipples at the State Fair
The state fair puts on display the usual cornucopia of wonders both natural and synthetic, all ready for your sampling. A young man gets in touch with his appetite.
The Querent
Fortunetelling is easy to ridicule, frequently misunderstood, and, for some people, extremely powerful. Unfortunately, what’s very tough to predict is what reading futures will do to the person with the cards.
Your Third Nipple
All your life, you thought you just had an odd-looking little mole. From 2011, what it’s like when a doctor says that you belong in the ranks of Marky Mark, centuries of witches, and Krusty the Clown.
The Crap in My Head
Little things people say can get stuck in your brain and become triggers, forcing you to relive moments you’d rather forget. Well, for aspiring linguists, it’s much, much worse.
Columbus to Cambria and Back Again
From coast to coast, through bickering passengers and aggressive tumbleweeds, we've crisscrossed the U.S.--and often ended up in New York. For your next road trip, a guide to what you'll see along the way.
The Sex Trade in Northwest Wisconsin
In a small town with a withering economy, rebellion is choosing college over your job at the X-rated drive-in.
The Age of Mechanical Reproduction
When it comes to in-vitro fertilization, nothing is normal. Your world is upside-down. Your doctor compliments your wife on her monkeys. Then, when every dollar and exertion has gone toward a single hour of hope, it begins to snow.
Sorry About Your Generation
Fact: Today’s young women are scared to commit because Mel Gibson may attack them. Fact: Today’s mothers should keep their opinions to themselves.
Letters to a Pitchikoo
Shoes, cars, T-shirts—it’s easy for people to become attached to favorite objects. But something is horribly wrong when a girl begins writing fan mail to her ring.
Trust Me
A century ago food vendors were often confidence men, cutting their products with inedible substances. A study of the history of food adulteration reveals hucksters at every turn.
Where the Choices Are Endless
After a childhood in the country, awaking as a freshman in a college town, where the inhabitants are willing and strange.
Caught Telling Fiction
The gap between literary and historical fiction is mostly a marketing ploy--at least until a novelist meets a survivor of her story's plot.
Fanboy
As America dreams of black ops teams, where do mutants belong? And can comics end wars? From Captain America to big blond Thor, Osama bin Laden, and beyond.
How the Dead Live
There’s a peculiar odor to burning hope—it’s the smell of exhaust fumes, human sweat, and a fast-food container interred under a seat cushion.
Not for Navigational Purposes
Maps are useful in jungles, classrooms, and when you need to cross a bombing ground during a storm. But they’re pointless when love implodes.
Will the Real Frank Smith Stand Up
Sharing a name with thousands of other men, even hundreds of thousands, can make for interesting email. Some of the messages that have landed in his inbox.
Work Is a Four-Letter Word
After 15 months of unemployment, our writer lands a job—complete with benefits, direct deposit, and a modern workspace design. Time to shop for dumpy sweaters.
When the Crescendo Is the Least of Your Worries
After practicing with his iPod—and feeling pretty good, actually—a novice discovers the extreme fear of conducting a professional orchestra.
A Song for Aretha
For decades, America has taken Aretha Franklin for granted, heard and loved and danced to her music without a second thought. Now’s the time to think again.
The Impossible Everything That Everybody Wants
In western Maryland, where the state’s already skinny, being a stutterer who can’t eat doesn’t help growing up. Paying tribute to 1980s Appalachia, home to American chariots.
Modern Hospitality
Faced with a stranger at the door seeking shelter for the night, what do you do?
The Karma Bum
When Allen Ginsberg stayed with my family, we played video games and read together. But the harmony was broken when the yoga began. It wouldn't be the last time.
Give and Take
December is the season for taking: taking money from strangers; taking care to avoid crying on the phone. Holiday confessions from a charity call-center employee.