Essays

FROM THE CHAPTER 16 ARCHIVE: For a child in small-town Alabama, books provided solace in summers without friends and activities.

I’d never been an outdoors kind of gal, but as my 74th birthday approached, I decided to tame our unruly back acre.

My daughter didn’t go to Alcatraz willingly. She grumbled the whole way, punctuating the morning with sarcasm: “Yay, it’s prison day!” Perhaps she was right — what purpose did it serve to see this horrific chapter of history?

Sometimes I wonder why anyone would want to live anywhere but the South and whether I’ve discovered some secret to life since moving here.

I arrange the clementines on the table next to the store-bought croissants and juice boxes; this has now become a ritual, though not a meditative one.

Thirty-six hours after my client was executed, I drove along the highway in the direction opposite the prison for my wisdom teeth extraction. The throb ballooning at the back of my gums had become a rhythmic, welcome distraction from the grief scratching my throat ragged.