You think Fine Arts is going to be a bird degree and then you have to take classes all through the summer and talk about art until you want to kill yourself and also everyone else.

I’m famous, and my sister Christine is ordinary. Saying it straight out like that feels strange, but it’s true. We’re identical twins, a fact that fascinates people.

When he came back from that first trip to India, all she could get out of him was that it was “awesome.” He was never a talker. It used to exasperate her when he was little; she’d want to shake him to get words out.

When lightning strikes the tulip poplar, five hundred years of leaf lifting crashes into splinter wood, and several notables roll over in their graves.

Outside the kitchen window, squirrels scattered the seed from the birdfeeder Paula’s dad had set up. The seeds gleamed in the sun like drops of water.

At the supermarket I see a young mother gently weeping in the cereal aisle. Her baby watches her curiously, possibly stumped by this reversal of roles, or too young to understand.

Our ten-year age difference seemed vast to me, not to him. It was lunch—our daily lunches at the small French restaurant across the street from our office—that bridged the gap.

If anybody follows me call 911. I live in apartment 12 but don’t go there if somebody stalks me. I should stay in a public place like Taco Bell or Walgreens.