Red's Wrap
Happiness. It's relative.
Tag: depression
99 New: Sustenance
My mother didn’t make pancakes. She made pancake. She would ask if I wanted her to make pancakes, but then she would produce a single pancake, a pancake the exact dimension of our cast iron frying pan. It was a thick, serious piece of… Continue Reading “99 New: Sustenance”
Writing Bleak
The problem with writing when you’re anxious or a little depressed is that everything ends up being about death – your own death, your spouse’s, your kids’, your dogs’, the death of the great American city, Death Be Not Proud, you get the idea.… Continue Reading “Writing Bleak”
You Need to See a Shrink
Originally posted on Red's Wrap:
Every time I drive this patch of road, which is almost everyday, I remember being told right at this exact spot, “You need to see a shrink.” I was the passenger in the car. The driver was my…
Return
Disability depresses. It struck me today how deeply I sank into a chronic state of melancholia over the past few years. My ever-worsening hearing disability ate away at my optimism and tested my ability to right myself. I became an Emily Dickenson figure in blue jeans,… Continue Reading “Return”
Inside Scoop
The trick to being happy is knowing how to manage unhappiness. I see all the blog posts, the lists of the ten things happy people do everyday, the five things happy people do before they wake up, the seventy secrets to happiness. I don’t… Continue Reading “Inside Scoop”
Secrets
Long ago, when I was a young woman and my boyfriend tried to end his life and ended up in intensive care after surgery to repair five stab wounds to his abdomen, my mother gave him rocks she’d found at the beach and a… Continue Reading “Secrets”
The Limits of Our Experience: Understanding Depression and Suicide
A few days ago, some people had a suicide story. Now, everyone has one. If you never knew anyone who died by suicide, not a single friend or relative, someone at work, down the block, you knew Robin Williams. Everybody knew Robin Williams. We knew… Continue Reading “The Limits of Our Experience: Understanding Depression and Suicide”
#12/100: Where’s Your Cart?
I think the secret to happiness is keeping control of your grocery cart. This isn’t as easy as it sounds. You can be inspecting the bananas or deciding how much more broccoli you can really bear to eat and that cart can just amble… Continue Reading “#12/100: Where’s Your Cart?”
Listen to Jan read her essay “Billy” presented on WUWM’s Lake Effect.
Jan’s essay “At the Breakfast Bar” on WUWM Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “The Parish Hall,” on WUWM Lake Effect May 27, 2020
“Fury Cannot Touch Me,” Modern Love, NYT, 9/29/11
