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I had never allowed myself this kind of hiatus. I was deliberately planless. I was even able to suppress the vague internalized lifetime reading plan that always nags me when I read trash. I decided to let myself read only whatever turned up in my vicinity. Fortunately the shelves in the house were…

In Africa, you want more, I think.

People get avid. This takes different forms in different people, but it shows up in some form in everybody who stays there any length of time. It can be sudden. I include myself.

Obviously I mean whites in Africa and not black Africans. The average black Afr…

Oh ho ho ho, Mrs. Robinson. He has over two thousand dollars’ worth of stereo equipment and five records. Simon and Garfunkel, Joni Mitchell, and three Beatles.

He had to find it. This jester, this tease, this invader that lurked like a virus in some secret body cells between outbreaks—he had this idea that if he fixed it, he could repair his life. Yes, everything would be better then. He could handle the schedule, the layoffs, the night administrator’s mu…

When I understood all the reasons for the bug, I again thought of Ethan Levin. I wished he’d still been alive to find the answers with me. I pictured us back in the break room that smelled of burnt coffee, whooping and high-fiving and then maybe going out for drinks. I had this idea we would have o…