Craig Cooley | May 8, 2008
I’ve worked as a letter-carrier for many years, and had just started a new delivery route at the Post Office. I was going through the usual learning curve. It’s not easy remembering 400-600 new names, not to mention which houses have dogs, which customers will constantly complain, and which ones will want to visit with [...]
Robin Sauerwein | February 6, 2008
“Michigan educators have stifled plans to teach a breathing exercise as part of a health course, bowing to opponents who worried that deep breathing could promote devil worship or mysticism. Other stress management techniques will be substituted, said Don Ben Sweeney of the Michigan Model for Comprehensive Health Education. “People look at it and say [...]
Elly Zupko | December 7, 2007
As I’m sitting on the carpet stretching out my hamstrings, I’m nose-level with the litter box, and I can smell it needs changing. I just finished chasing my cat around the apartment. His pupils were dilated until they almost completely eclipsed his golden irises. Hiding under the bed now, he’s frightened witless. I often wonder [...]
Marilyn Westfall | October 4, 2007
At Mission Delores, San Francisco:
Religious Romance & Genocide
IV - Reflections & Models
Prior to 1769 and the first missions, likely 350,000 to a million native peoples lived in what is now California. Five-hundred independent tribes spoke as many as one hundred languages or dialects-by estimates of linguists and anthropologists. There was great diversity in customs, rituals, [...]
Marilyn Westfall | October 3, 2007
At Mission Delores, San Francisco:
Religious Romance & Genocide
III - The Cemetery, Graves & Roses
At the entrance to the mission cemetery, I hear traffic flow on Dolores Street, which parallels the mission but is blocked from sight by a wall landscaped with trees and shrubs. Tires drone, now a tailpipe or muffler drags on the road [...]
Marilyn Westfall | October 2, 2007
At Mission Delores, San Francisco:
Religious Romance & Genocide
II - The Museum, Fact & Facsimile
An older German couple, standing in front of me, reviews the Register, a record of all the Indians baptized at Mission Dolores. Many of these were likely forced conversions, from natives rounded up by soldiers and put to work, creating bricks, gardening, [...]
Marilyn Westfall | October 1, 2007
At Mission Delores, San Francisco:
Religious Romance & Genocide
I - The Chapel, An Odyssey
The soured wood of the church doors flavors the air. Stone tile cools my knees. I unzip my forest green backpack and remove a notepad wedged between books and my rolled-up windbreaker. On the dusky burgundy squares, my pack is a lump disrupting [...]
John Heckman Wright | September 24, 2007
The Reverend in his quick, excited tongue, proclaims the end times are near. Every headline becomes an affirmation and a warning. As his excitement grows, he slams his fists on the lectern, stomps across the stage, his pacing accelerates in volume and pitch, until his vaulted voice builds to a battle cry of fire, brimstone, [...]
Marilyn Westfall | August 31, 2007
The Pierced Lady
Waiting for the shuttle bus into San Francisco, the woman in leather shivered. Her sandy hair was tucked behind ears upholstered with gold rings and studs. On her neck, where her collar was short, climbed a tattoo’s red ink of wings or flames. Her amber eyes blinked as she excused her breath: “I [...]
