Tag: Family

Jessica Keener’s Night Swim, A Decade Later

A new anniversary edition of Night Swim gives us a chance to reexamine our conversations about antisemitism, reproductive rights, and care work– ten years later. 

I Am Russian… In Name Only

I am not Russian, but I speak Russian. It’s a kind of nonconsensual tattoo Stalin left behind on my parents—better tattooed than dead.

Gut Morgen, Rifka Leibowitz

I never met my Great Aunt Rifka or even saw a photograph of her. Yet I’ve always had a clear picture of her in my mind, in a wheelchair, smiling.  She has no legs and she’s wearing a fur stole with fox heads. 

My Hair as a Metaphor

My hair was a problem to be solved. From inside and outside the walls of my house, my hair was a symbol of something larger that had nothing and everything to do with me.

Why My Hair Falls the Way it Does

Between the Jewish high holiday celebrations and family reunions in Brooklyn, New York, it was easier to say I was Jamaican and Jewish than it was for me to actually believe it.

Where Was the “Peace” 400 Years Ago?

I thought my father hadn’t fought that day because he gave in. I thought he had let them win, when in reality, he had decided that his life, vows, and the promises that he had made to his wife and children trumped everything.

A Debut Novel About Family

What constitutes a good mother? A good father? A good daughter? A normal life? These are questions posed by R.L. Maizes in her compelling debut novel Other People’s Pets.