October 2025 | nonfiction
I stole your handwriting:
Dear Elsie,
I know it’s been a while since we last connected. It’s been at least 12 years now, bar the occasional Instagram like or Christmas card from your mother. I have something to confess. You might have caught on in the fourth grade — and maybe that is the real reason why we stopped sending letters to each other after you moved away to Virginia — but I spent nine whole months attempting to copy your style of handwriting.
Maybe it was jealousy. It was definitely jealousy. What nine-year-old wouldn’t be jealous of the classmate that consistently wins drawing contests for litter clean-up and yearbook covers? Maybe one that had grown up with siblings, but that wasn’t me.
In February of fourth grade, you went through a phase where you’d dot all of your i’s with teeny-tiny hearts. It was novel — brilliant, even. I’d never seen such a spectacle and I was beside myself. What could I do to match your artistry? I tried smiley faces. I tried tiny stars. Nothing seemed to click. Thankfully, that phase was short-lived, but the two weeks it lasted made “free-write time” a waking nightmare.
For a good, long while, I relished every compliment. I had made your handwriting my own. I had earned those compliments. When I reached young adulthood, the mask started to slip. After all, I hadn’t really developed my own handwriting. I believed that I was living a lie… but then I thought about it for two seconds and realized that at that point in my life, the way I wrote was going to be my script for the rest of my life. I was past the point of developing fine motor skills — so, why should I care if I copied your handwriting in elementary school. It’s not like we’re going to sit next to each other in Ms. Kelly’s dusty, air condition-less room ever again.
In short: I stole your handwriting. It’s mine now. It’s kind of like a squatter’s rights situation we have going on here. And because I don’t know what yours looks like at this point in our lives, I’m assuming you can’t get your old script back. Maybe it looks even more polished now, or maybe you picked up cursive.
You might be a calligrapher or a sign artist at Trader Joe’s. I have no real way of knowing based on your social media presence, but I sincerely hope you’re doing well. Your Our My handwriting has served me well. Thank you.
All my love.
Carlin Steere
Carlin Steere
Carlin Steere is an experimental personal essayist and poet, dividing her time between the New England shoreline and Tampa, Florida. Her work has been published by Yale News, Sweet: A Literary Confection, and the Exeter Green Words Poetry Anthology — among other publications.
October 2025 | nonfiction
Last Dance
Take politicians, for example. Some know when to bow out gracefully; others hang on doggedly, even after their health, energy, and mental acuity have begun to compromise their effectiveness. (Sorry, Joe, that includes you.) The time of reckoning seems to hover around the age of 80. Some still claim good health and all their marbles and see no reason not to keep going. Bernie at 83 and Nancy at 85—still fighting the good fight. Others may yearn for the calm and quiet of private life, be ready to retire from the rat race.
I ran my last half marathon at 80, my last 10K a year later. My race times were still good, my legs still strong, but I didn’t want to wait for something to go wrong. It was time, and I’ve had no doubts, no regrets. A friend is going strong at 84, and runners in their 80s are still clocking the miles and crossing the finish line at the Boston Marathon every year. I cheer their successes but don’t yearn to be among them.
There’s no retirement age for writers, no urgency that might compel them to stop. Alice Munro and Philip Roth called it quits at around 80, though I’ll bet both could have kept producing quality work if they’d chosen to. Like Margaret Atwood, her creativity and energy seemingly boundless at 85. My friend Priscilla Long published a book about creativity in old age at 79, her fifth book since turning seventy, and said that she had plans for ten more.
Age isn’t the determining factor, but here I am at 81 wondering if it’s time to throw in the towel. I’m in excellent health, can still wield a pencil, type fast, read fine print on paper and screen. Yet writing has become a struggle. I moan to friends: the well is dry. Dredging and pumping yield nothing. Is it temporary or permanent? Have I said all I want to say?
A wise friend advises, “Don’t stay too long at the dance when you feel there is no dance left in you.” But how do you recognize that feeling? I’ve kicked off my dancing shoes, and I enjoy sitting it out, watching and listening from my seat on the sidelines. Maybe this is it; maybe I’m done. But then I pick up a beat … I start tapping my toes … my body sways with the rhythm. Maybe once more around the floor?
Alice Lowe
Alice Lowe’s flash nonfiction has been published this past year in Broken Teacup, Bluebird Word, Masque & Spectacle, Painted Pebble Lit Mag, Skipjack Review, In Short, Drifting Sands, and Burningword. She has been twice cited in Best American Essays. Alice writes about life, literature, food, and family in San Diego, California. Read and reach her at www.aliceloweblogs.wordpress.com
October 2025 | nonfiction
Sleeping Arrangements
- On a Bronx fire escape, curled up on couch cushions, desperate for a breeze
- With my sister in a top bunk that belongs to our cousin, in a room that isn’t ours, in a Brooklyn apartment never meant for us
- In a bedroom hardly bigger than the bed, with my mother and my brother and my sister, lying head to foot in a pointless effort to give each other space
- On two lumpy armchairs shoved together as a makeshift berth after the first eviction
- Near the window in an armchair, pen still in hand, scribbling my stories before morning traffic wakes the others
- At a desk in class, chin propped on palm, until an ill-shaven Jesuit pauses his lecture on Aeschylus to poke me with his cane
- On a carpeted floor that smells of beer and party smoke, too drunk to drive home, too scared to face my mom
- In too many beds with too many strangers hoping I’ll wake early and be gone
- Beneath the sound of a seagull’s song in the hot, salty air, on a blanket not far from the water’s edge
- In a rocker near the window, where a streetlamp keeps watch nonchalantly while I nurse a baby too curious to sleep
- Night after night under a Ninja Turtles comforter with a child in my arms till his fever breaks or the bogyman concedes defeat
- On a train that left for the city before dawn, crowded with thick coats, aging briefcases, and rigid to-do lists
- With two restless Little Leaguers, all elbows and knees, who’ve stayed up too late, wired on candy they’ve looted in Frankenstein’s name
- In our cabin’s top bunk, with bugs rude and riotous outside and my knees scraping the ceiling’s wooden planks
- At the dining room table at two in the morning, face down on a yellow legal pad crammed with fits and starts of dialogue and margin notes
- In costly New York hotel rooms paid for by clients who expect me at their conference tables at eight a.m. sharp, no matter how many first days of school I have to miss
- In a flimsy tent with my eight-year-old, both frightened by the pounding rain and relentless darkness
- In a window seat, engines growling, legs cramped, hours to go
- On a recliner, clutching a Teddy bear, waiting again for a teenager to arrive home safely
- On someone else’s sheets, with someone else’s husband
- At a New England B&B, the smell of bacon drifting in, the day ours alone
- On my meditation cushion, with the best of intentions
- Folded into the arms of someone who loves me, at last
- Sitting at my desk in Midtown, chair turned toward the windows of the fortieth floor across the way, framing suits that move with mysterious purpose and talk that makes no sound
- On the shoulder of a Mets fan, somewhere in the sixth inning
- In a Broadway theatre, on a New York weeknight in a seat we paid too much for
- Fitfully, in a chair at the bedside of my son drying out in an emergency ward
- Swaying in a hammock under a June night’s sky, believing the worst is over
- In a queen-sized bed, in a master bedroom, alone
- Soundly on a loveseat in my study, a first draft finally done
- Tossing and turning in a room beneath a room where a young man lies homeless again, no match for his demons, fearing I will trade my life for his
- With the touch of a grandchild’s breath on my cheek, his weight on my heart, sensing but not seeing that there’s only this moment
Mary Ann McGuigan
Mary Ann McGuigan’s creative nonfiction has appeared in SmokeLong Quarterly, Brevity, Citron Review, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. The Sun, Massachusetts Review, North American Review, and many other journals have published her fiction. Her collection Pieces includes stories named for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net; her new story collection, That Very Place, was released in September 2025. The Junior Library Guild and the New York Public Library rank Mary Ann’s novels as best books for teens; Where You Belong was a finalist for the National Book Award. She loves visitors: www.maryannmcguigan.com.
October 2025 | nonfiction
Between Starbucks and Malibu Yogurt
Eight of us sit in Sunset Plaza, sipping our lackluster decaf Americanos a little too slowly, savoring our last few moments outside The Center. The non-caffeinated version doesn’t taste the same as the real stuff, but caffeine is barred in treatment. Too many of us abused it as an appetite suppressant.
I catch Maritza eyeing the frozen yogurt shop longingly—another anorexic food group. In treatment, it’s either real ice cream or gelato, no low-fat, low-calorie substitutions. If you’re not getting your period, it’s full-fat ice cream for you. She sucks down the rest of her iced coffee. Black with two Splenda. No milk, never milk.
A man so tan I can make out white lines around his wrists where woven bracelets must have once been walks his golden retriever around the parking lot. The man is beautiful, and so is the dog. The dog’s coat looks show-ready, spun gold. I forget myself, where I am, and who I’m with, so I admire them, wondering what kind of life these two live and what kind of home they’ll return to.
Then, I hear Maritza whisper, Dog. Dog. Where’s Chloe? The word “dog” spreads around our circle, a panicked, high-stakes game of telephone. Get the message to the CNA before Chloe sees the dog. If we can warn the CNA, she can remove Chloe from the vicinity, we can avoid Chloe’s biggest trigger. We’re too late, though. Chloe sees the dog and thinks of her father’s hands. She puts her head between her knees and starts rocking back and forth, moaning long and low.
Two girls, late teens, walk out of Malibu Yogurt. They use their tongues to pick gummy worms, pieces of Oreo, and Heath Bar off the top of their curated dessert peaks. The girls see Chloe rocking back and forth, back and forth, and avert their eyes. I stare at them. I will them to look at me, I will them to look back at Chloe, I will them to walk away.
They quicken their pace when they reach the parking lot, giggling behind their palms. Once in the car, the driver rolls down all the windows, and the passenger takes her hair down. I watch them peel onto the 101 heading south. The passenger lets her hand dangle out the window, and I keep my eyes on their car until I can’t anymore, and I have no choice but to turn back.
Miranda Morgan
Miranda Morgan is a writer who proudly hails from Santa Fe, New Mexico. She has worked as a writer and producer for various docuseries and unscripted TV projects. Her TV credits include series that have appeared (or will appear) on networks such as History Channel, Animal Planet, Discovery, INSP, PBS, Fox, and others. In 2019, Miranda was awarded a Fulbright Grant to Bergen, Norway, where she taught academic writing workshops and the very first creative writing class at the University of Bergen. She earned her MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of Montana and is at work on her first novel. She is a Visiting Professor of English at Pacific Lutheran University.
October 2025 | nonfiction
Transfer
Long crooked stem, blunt thorns, deep red, tight center, black ridging outer petals that curled back—I forget how I acquired the rose. People were always giving me flowers, but I bought them, too. I could guess a bouquet’s price in any neighborhood, or vased on someone’s shelf, with stunning accuracy. I picked up many a five that way, guessing to the penny, knowing that if I bet more I’d feel too guilty to take the money. I was waiting to transfer at the 168th street station, a dank cavern sepia-ed in failing light and staling urine. It took anywhere from five to one hundred fifty—but usually forty—minutes for the train to come. I read Moby Dick and War and Peace on the subway, but that night I had Beloved. When I felt nervous I took a cab, reasoning that if I got attacked I’d kick myself if I’d ignored my instincts, but it was a long way to Inwood. Cab drivers always tried to take the bridge, because they didn’t believe Manhattan went up that high; I’d have to fight to keep them on the Henry Hudson—a repeating course in assertion. I was nineteen. Some drivers asked me out, some confessed that they were on drugs, one muttered over and over that I was as tender as a young brussel sprout, but we were above 176th, and I was scared to make him pull over and let me out on the dark un-sidewalked thoroughfare — there was no riverwalk then—so if I felt OK, I’d save the twenty dollars. I slipped the rose into the triangles of space between the crooked elbows and concave chest of a long thin homeless man, hugging himself as he slept it off on a bench, then chose a place to stand where I’d see anyone approaching (I wasn’t dressed for the walk of shame and thought it was obvious that I was waitress coming home with a wad of cash and wanted to be ready) and watch the rats emerge from the tracks, the third rail, the garbage, the puddles, and the chunked-out walls exactly as they emerged if you were hallucinating them coming down from acid or X while I waited and read. Two chattering women crossed the platform. I did not fear them; I saved my fear for men. They looked dressed for church or a baby shower—vinyl pumps with ankle-wobbling heels, pastel polyester dresses with deep ruffled necklines. Tiny hats. Stiff curls with banded grooves where bobby pins had recently secured plastic rollers. The bar closed at four and it took until five to get out of there, and I’d made it this far from the village, the women were probably headed to an early service. They were loud and bright, and I watched them without turning my head. One slipped the rose out, like a Pick Up Stick, or a Kerplunk skewer, without waking the sleeper, but her friend said, “that’s not for you” and made her put it back.
MFC Feeley
MFC Feeley has an MFA in fiction from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and is a board member of 49 Writers. She wrote a series of ten stories inspired by the Bill of Rights for Ghost Parachute and has published in Best Micro-Fictions, SmokeLong, Jellyfish Review, Pulp Literature, and others. Her one-minute memoir was featured on Brevity Blog. Feeley was a writer in residence at The National Willa Cather Center and a Fellow at the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. She has been nominated for Best Small Fictions, The Pushcart Prize, was an Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Quarterfinalist, and has judged for Scholastic. More at MFCFeeley.com
October 2025 | nonfiction
What I Could Have Said Instead
“Selfish!” he spat towards me as I stood to leave.
“Huh, I wonder where I learned that?”
Holy crap, I think to myself. Where did that come from?
I mean, it’s true. Dad was selfish and self-centered.
Now, his dementia puts him into a separate category of selfish and self-centered. He can only think of himself—just like a toddler. His hunger, his needs, his wants.
I am just finishing spending a week at his house to help with his care, closely inspecting anything found in the fridge—even the condiments—before ingesting it, throwing away black-market Viagra, snooping through his papers to see what his financial situation is, staying in the damp dark guest room making sure to always keep the door closed so his cats don’t pee on my suitcase. I have taken time off work, been away from my kids, my husband, and my cat who doesn’t pee where she’s not supposed to. And now that my sister has arrived to relieve me, I’m going to go home.
It’s my 47th birthday, which he has not acknowledged at any point throughout the day.
He just told me he wants to die and I am thinking about how I could help him even though I decide that I am not going to help him die on my own birthday. Of course, he doesn’t know any of this.
Selfish! I could have ignored it and said: “I love you, Dad. I’ll see you next week.”
Selfish! I could have bent to whisper in his ear: “Get your affairs in order, I’ll be back to help you.”
Selfish! I could have brushed it off: “Sure, Dad, whatever you say!” or “Oh, Dad, don’t be so dramatic!”
But what I really say: “I wonder where I learned that?”
Paula Burke
Paula Burke lives and writes along the Salish Sea. She is revising a memoir that is variously about old cars, family lingo, bad birthdays, and her father’s seven-year descent into dementia. Her work has been published in the Seattle Review of Books, Booth, and Hippocampus. Paula will always look at the dessert menu.
