As a final project, the class was divided into two groups and given the instructions to get the oral history of a group of people, then bring their stories to life in a final presentation. Our team was assigned LGBT and we went to work.

I remember interviewing one of my residents about how she came out in high school, but I also interviewed a woman who was in her 50s. She said that she was married to a man, or maybe she was getting a divorce, when she saw a photograph of a lesbian couple on the front of a magazine.

“I want to be in love like that,” she said to herself. There was something in the photograph that communicated straight to her soul and she recognized what she wanted from her life. By the time our paths crossed in that interview, she was in love like that.

I assume the primary lesson wasn’t supposed to be that sometimes a photograph or essay will suddenly focus your needs, wants or desires, but for years I’ve heard that sentence ring in my head. “I want to be in love like that,” and wondered what or who my “like that” could possibly be.

***

Roger Ebert died today. Only yesterday he published a noticed that his cancer had relapsed and he would be taking a “Leave of Presence” from the Sun Times. As I watched the remembrances fly by on Twitter, I didn’t really have a similar story as many of my friends.

I remember growing up watching him give a thumbs up or a thumbs down on TV. I certainly watched on a regular basis. When he joined Twitter, I remember tweeting once that it was a shame he had fewer followers than I did at the time. There was a hot second when I was almost hired to teach him how to better use Twitter, but then he learned how to tweet on his own.

There was one of his epic blog posts that stuck out in my memory. My Name is Roger, and I’m an Alcoholic. Reading that post gave me a window into the sixth member of my immediate family – AA. My dad recently had a public celebration of 30 years of sobriety and volunteer leadership among the friends of Bill W.

An A.A. meeting usually begins with a recovering alcoholic telling his “drunkalog,” the story of his drinking days and how he eventually hit bottom. This blog entry will not be my drunkalog. What’s said in the room, stays in the room. You may be wondering, in fact, why I’m violating the A.A. policy of anonymity and outing myself. A.A. is anonymous not because of shame but because of prudence; people who go public with their newly-found sobriety have an alarming tendency to relapse. Case studies: those pathetic celebrities who check into rehab and hold a press conference.

That was the post that made Roger E. someone I could have met at a New Years Eve or Super Bowl party down at the Old Jail… had Roger E ever attended meetings in my hometown.

***

Today when I found out that he died, I read his obituaries and started reblogging quotes onto my Tumblr.

About his wife, Chaz…

“She fills my horizon, she is the great fact of my life, she is the love of my life, she saved me from the fate of living out my life alone,” he wrote.

About traveling with his wife,

Romance in the winter in Venice is intimate and private, almost hushed. One night we went to the Municipal Casino, carefully taking only as much money as we were ready to lose, and lost it. In a little restaurant we had enough left for spaghetti with two plates and afterward lacked even the fare for the canal bus. We walked the long way back through the night and cold, our arms around each other, figures appearing out of the fog, lights traced on the wet stones, pausing now and again to kiss and be solemn.

About choosing a partner,

Never marry someone who doesn’t love the movies you love. Sooner or later, that person will not love you.

Chaz and Roger about marrying each other,

Chaz had been married before, so she knew what taking that step would mean. “I think that I am better in marriage. I like taking care of people and having someone there in my corner and being in someone’s corner.” Roger, on the other hand, had been single into his forties. But looking back, he doesn’t recall any trouble adapting. “I had been single long enough,” he says.”

Finally, a friend posted a link to his epic 20th anniversary post Roger Loves Chaz. Just go read all of it. I’ll wait.

***

I want to be in love like that.

We formed a serious bond rather quickly. It was an understood thing. I was in love, I was serious, I was ready for my life to change. I had been on hold too long.

I want to be in love like that.

I saved every one of her letters along with my own, and have them encrypted on my computer, locked inside a file where I can’t reach them because the program and the operating system are now 20 years out of date. But they’re in there. I’m not about to entrust them to anyone at the Apple Genius Counter.

I want to love like that.

We were sitting there talking in a little cafe at the end of a happy day and I became overwhelmed with the desire to propose marriage. Chaz filled my mind. She excited me physically. She was funny. She made a reading of my life rather quickly, understood what I did and how I had to do it..

Like that.

I resented her unceasing encouragement. I was lazy. It was ever so much preferable to sit and read. But she was making me do the right thing. She did it all over again after my next three tours through the Rehabilitation Institute. Four times I learned to walk again…

And I want to be in love like that. To be in either shoe. And like Chaz seemed to so gracefully do today, to say goodbye to the love of my life when our time together is over.

***

Roger Ebert didn’t teach me to love movies or inspire me to write, but he and Chaz certainly inspire me to love and show that there is room for love and partnership in the dizzying space of a demanding career. Maybe, just maybe, I can make room and let a man into my life and have a love like that.

***

May his memory be a blessing.

In 1979 my brother Leo wanted me to help him with the harvest. I didn’t go. It was really that simple. He wanted me to go back, at least for a few days. Didn’t matter. I kept as far away as possible from that undulate landscape. His father, my stepdad, wasn’t exactly a guy I ever wanted to see again. Not that he was good for much by that point. Pretty doddery. Didn’t have any stake in the place any more. But history’s history. And he wasn’t dead yet.

It wasn’t my fault Mom left in the early sixties. But after she did, after she left me there with Leo and him? You better believe he didn’t make me feel welcome on the old homestead. He came after me with a length of two-by-four one time. Right across the grass. Waving that thing like he meant to level me with it. I could have been killed. I was just a kid. Maybe twelve. If that.

I got home around six, seven at the latest. And. Okay. I forgot to bring home a new pair of tinsnips. And. Yes. He had asked me to do that for him.

Leo was already gone. Out with some girlfriend. So his dad couldn’t ask him to get a pair in town. I couldn’t call him and solve anything either. Before cell phones. What are you gonna do?

That jackass came tearing after me and I just took off, ran up through Bakers’ back field, over to the south, around this knoll that kept the wind from penetrating too bad, and just camped down for the night. No fire. I sure didn’t want his ass flushing me out. Just rolled myself up and slept there on the abandoned backseat of some old Chevy Tri-Five.

Leo never knew. I went back in the morning. Never said a word about any of it. Leo was telling us both about that date of his. But I wasn’t listening and neither was his dad. I remember how he looked up at me when I walked through the door, kind of relieved but still pretty much beyond intimidating. Like, “Don’t you open your mouth.” So I didn’t.

Leo would have paid me for that harvest. Probably. Probably would have paid anything I asked.

Neither of us was thirty. Close to it, both. But I didn’t go back. Leo always says how he would have split the place with me. But seventy-five acres in Iowa. Who needs it? Just enough land that you can’t manage it on your own but not enough to justify having any real help.

Stepbrothers aren’t blood anyway. Who is he to me? What am I to him?

I can still see Leo though, with his hair the same color as those husks and his tan skin. I mean he was the farmer. Not me. He did better in the heat than I did. I was always heavier, burnt skin peeling off everywhere, sweating through long sleeves in August. Couldn’t hardly stand to be outside for the glare of the sun.

Years later I found out what happened. Leo had a quarter of the corn in, was up on the hopper, must have slipped. Didn’t go down into the grain at least. But he fell face forward from about fifteen feet. Broke his wrist in three places and shattered his tibia.

I didn’t know. Yeah, he called. He called a few times. Up at that pay phone in the sandwich shack across from where I was working at the time. The girl there, Angela, came over to tell me he was on the phone. I know at least twice.

But I thought he was just going to guilt me. Shame me about not being home.

I couldn’t give up my job to work for him for just two weeks. It was a new job. I had a delivery route—Slushie flavoring, pretzels, popcorn containers. Shit like that for movie theaters. Drove all around. My whole car was full of those damn stickers with that blue and white basset hound. Had one on the car even.

And maybe that was part of why I didn’t go back, too. Leo would have laughed me out of town with that sticker on my car.

I wasn’t ashamed of it. It was my job. Didn’t bother me. But I didn’t need to hear about it. Vanity I guess. Youth. Pride. Something. Although I guess no one really grows out of that stuff.

He was just the same. Only two years older than me. I have no idea why he didn’t tell that Angela about his broken wrist, about his shin. That would have changed things. I would have gone home. I think it would have made a difference. His old man was skinny by then, more resigned. I knew that. Not in my heart, which was still so terrified. Maybe I could have been reasonable even if he wasn’t my real brother. But Leo wasn’t about to admit anything to any stranger over the phone. He didn’t even really tell her he wanted me to help with harvest. I just knew by the time of year.

There was family land everywhere. And too hard to work it. Margins were shit.

He just sold the whole place to a subdivision developer. Right then. That last time he called me. I found out later that he thanked Angela, hung up the phone, picked it back up again, looked through that pathetic excuse for the area’s Yellow Pages, and found a real estate agent. Had him come right on out to the place. Did an appraisal on the spot, named his price, and the developer about gave him cash in hand.

No one said anything about urban sprawl back then. There weren’t neighborhoods of kids playing basketball where you used to do hay. Everyone had land to sell. It wasn’t a big deal. He made a phone call and that was it. Six weeks later he was studying up to be an agent for the extension service.

The rest of the grain came in, though. A few neighbors did what they could for him. Gathered what was left. Covered most of his costs. It’s okay. That’s how it is. The harvest went on. It always does, somehow. Just not there, not with him or me.

Author bio: Best New American Voices nominee Nath Jones received an MFA in creative writing from Northwestern University. Her publishing credits include PANK Magazine, There Are No Rules, and Sailing World. She lives and writes in Chicago.

Want Nath to do some Fiction Improv for your blog? Let her know.

Below is my general schedule, please email me if you want to hang out.

Thursday, 2/21Arrive at 9am
Dinner and drinks at 8PM in Tel Aviv. Open Invite.

Friday, 2/22
Morning in TLV, afternoon head out for Shabbat

Saturday, 2/23
Shabbat with friends
Return to TLV Motzei Shabbat

Sunday, 2/24
TLV All Day
Possible Purim party in J’lem

Monday, 2/25
Open day in TLV

Tuesday, 2/26
Go to J’lem in AM

Wednesday, 2/27
Open day in J’lem
Bar night at Ha’Gov, open invite

Thursday, 2/28
Last day in Israel
Dinner with the newlyweds

Friday, 3/1
5AM flight back to States, who wants to pick me up at 3PM at ORD?

“You know how you dream about chicken pot pie?” Ronnie asks.

“I don’t dream about chicken pot pie.”

“But if you did, I know of a place that sells the chicken pot pie you dream of.”

According to my archives, it’s been nine years since Ronnie asked me that in the parking lot of Demon Dogs. Demon Dogs has long since been demolished and the perfect chicken pot pie at Jack’s has long since fallen from the pedestal of being food worth dreaming about, but our friendship has long since… survived.

I think my cousin’s boyfriend’s roommate’s sister might have been in his class at Second City, but I don’t remember meeting Ronnie or exactly how I fell into his comedy social group. I just remember that he became a friend soon after I moved to Chicago.

The short story is that we have found a new place to have Chicken Pot Pies and that place is Pleasant House Bakery in Bridgeport. I requested them for special pie night (Thursdays) and Art said, “Hell yeah!” and put them on the menu. So Thursday night we had amazing chicken pot pie for the first time in years.

Yankee Chicken… the kind of chicken pot pie you dream about.

The long story is that as soon as I start thinking about our friendship, endless vignettes begin to pop up in my memory.

The one time we same side sat at Jack’s, so he could help me with my Hebrew homework. The time he called when I was transferring from the Brown line to the Blue line, catching me 50 feet from a cell phone dead zone and I was able to reroute to hang out over Mexican food. That time our trips to Israel overlapped and we had salads on Emek Rafaim in the German Colony. Drinking champagne in my condo the night closed and the day before I moved in. Sitting in his office the day I got my offer letter for my current job, passing him the phone and making him tell me what the offer was.

That time when… that time when… that time when…

Daniel Edelman and Jesse Jackson, 2008

Edelman founder Daniel J. Edelman passed away. I find myself far more upset than I should be for someone who worked at Edelman for only 3.5 years and has been gone nearly as long as I worked there.

So I tried to unpack it and figure out why this man’s passing has left me crying at my desk this morning.

In May 2005, I was managing an ice cream parlor in Ravenswood. I’d recently closed on my condo and the week I closed my paycheck bounced twice. It wasn’t the first time that my paycheck had bounced and friends finally had an intervention and convinced me to resign from my job.

I had no plan other than I needed an employer who didn’t make their employees beg for paychecks or let them bounce when the check was finally written. A temp agency placed me at Edelman as an administrative assistant. As I often tell the story, “I was an admin with a blog at a time when blogs were becoming important.”

I went temp to perm as an admin at Edelman in July 2005 and in July 2006, I transferred to the me2revolution with Phil Gomes, Rick Murray, Michael Wiley, Steve Rubel, Ming Yee and two colleagues in Sweden. It was with this small team, under Richard Edelman’s watch, that we worked to develop how public relations could use Web 2.0 in the changing media landscape.

As a part of that team, I traveled the US training colleagues on the basics of what we now call social media. I was able to visit Germany and meet European colleagues. I made connections with our Asian colleagues who came to Chicago for training. I learned the agency ropes at the world’s largest independent PR firm.

One of the things I loved about working at Edelman was the origin story. Everyone in Chicago knew the tale of how Dan had created the modern media tour with the Toni Twins. I never worked with him, but was proud to work for him.

I left Edelman in 2009 to try to do my own thing. I worked with rabbis and rock stars, later going to a start-up and finally rejoining agency life at Olson in 2011. I’m a fan of turning around and looking at sign posts that are only visible in hindsight.

Without Edelman, I have no idea where I would be today, which means that without Dan Edelman, I have no idea where I would be. I can not fathom any life but the one I have today, but I only have it because a temp agency placed me at Edelman and because Edelman was willing to take a chance on an admin who had a blog when blogs were becoming important.

He wasn’t a saint and our industry is far from perfect, but through a long series of events he changed my life and the lives of many more. His memory will certainly be a blessing.

“Honour your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.”

Exodus 20:12

On Friday, I celebrated 7 years since I went before a beit din and immersed in the mikvah, officially joining the Jewish people. In the last 7 years, I’ve been to Israel 7 times, remained a member of my synagogue and balanced the responsibility of having created an interfaith family for my family of origin.

My parents have been particularly supportive of my conversion and Jewish life. They tend to agree that the values aren’t so different than the values they raised us with, just the structure and ritual.

I think when I studied abroad in Argentina, we all started learning that how a country is portrayed in the news is very different than how it is for the people living there. When I was in La Plata, any protest involved students with drums and people rolling out a few tires to set on fire. The police yawned and got out their riot gear and portable fences.

Every protest or rally had burning tires. Every rally had cops in riot gear. It was part of the show. How things were in a 20 years young democracy in Latin America.

Much the same way, we’ve grown accustomed to the Israel I visit being vastly different than the Israel they see on the nightly news. My parents have never asked me to cancel a trip.

I was supposed to leave for Israel on Thursday this week. Supposed to. Yesterday I canceled my plane ticket after a week of debate. Through it all, my parents only once mentioned “have you considered delaying your trip?”

I talked to friends – Jewish and non-Jewish. Israeli and American (and French). IDF reserves and those who never served. At the end of the day, I decided to postpone my trip. In part it comes down to the fifth commandment – that you should honor your mother and father.

i also see friends getting called up to the reserves. People posting about their desire to eat comfort food at home… near their bomb shelters. Friends asking for a quick prayer because their walk to work includes 10 minutes through a park without a place to get shelter. Every time someone reassures me that Tel Aviv and Jerusalem are safe, a siren goes off and they race to a bomb shelter.

So when ever my friend who never counsels anyone to cancel their trips to Israel said, “now is not the time to go,” I heeded his warning and canceled. My parents told me they were incredibly relieved and now I don’t have to worry about their blood pressure while I’m on holiday.

I hope history proves me wrong. I hope a cease-fire is called today and that life goes back to normal, with an extra side of peace, tomorrow. That time will show I shouldn’t have canceled my trip.

Instead I’ll wait until it is less of a guessing game. Until my friends are no longer running to bomb shelters. Until my friends are released from reserve duty in the IDF. And I’ll be back… February at the latest.

I promise.

I have watched the tweets go by since the beginning of the Arab Spring. Atrocities and triumphs. I feel disconnected, but aware. Horrified, but hopeful. Somewhat informed, but neutered in my ability to help anywhere in the world.

This week attention has once again shifted to the Middle Eastern country closest to my heart and full of personal friends. Israel. The rockets from Gaza into Israel were greater in frequency, then the IDF retaliated.

Rockets. Missiles. Missile defense. Air raid sirens. Leaflets falling. Running to bomb shelters. Tweeted propaganda. Through it all, each side is doubling down on old tropes. Dehumanizing the other side and detailing generations of fighting.

I have friends across the political spectrum with regards to Israel. I continue to follow friends far to the right and far to the left of me. I think it keeps me properly unbalanced and that’s where I want to be. I don’t want to be certain that anyone has the right to kill anyone else. While I believe in the right to self defense, I don’t want to believe in a world that needs to much of it.

I don’t want to double down on an old story that dehumanizes the enemy. I don’t want to see my friends in danger. I don’t want to see the silence as friends get called up from reserves back into the army. I don’t want to cancel my vacation to Israel that is scheduled for Thanksgiving break.

As I sit down to Shabbat dinner with friends tonight, we’ll pray for peace. We’ll gingerly talk about Israel and Gaza. We’ll hope for a meaningful cease fire when we wake up on Saturday morning.

I wanted to share the greatest lesson I ever learned from Cristina. She treated us as peers. By “us” I mean the residence directors. We were in our early 20s, mostly single and all trying to find a place in the world. She turned 50 the year we worked together and got the most amazing tattoo to celebrate her heritage.

One night she told us the story of how she’d come to own a couch. Her whole adult life, she’d had futons. Portable and affordable, the futon is for the person who chooses not to settle down. When she got to Durango, she bought a couch.

She told us, “Buy a couch and live like you’re going to stay.” We were in a transient industry. Hall directors move colleges every couple years, in and out of college administration. It is years before you settle down, so a futon makes sense.

Not to Cristina.

She wanted us to buy couches and live like we were going to stay. Volunteer off campus. Date. Make friends outside of the university. Since that talk, a fleeting 5 minutes during dinner, I have always had a couch.

I try hard to live like I’m going to stay. Oh, Cristina, you’re memory is a blessing to me and thousands more.

Reblogged from City Club Chicago Videos:

 "Two Visions for Chicago's Schools"

October 15, 2012

http://blip.tv/city-club-presents-inside-chicago/diane-ravitch-professor-of-education-at-new-york-university-6400538

Then I have a weekend like this weekend that included my kitchen being out of commission because of a fire set by contractors. My furnace being out of commission because of the fire extinguisher used by the contractors. My mood being out of commission because of the marathon wrapping around my block and cutting me off from coffee, food and escaping the cold of my apartment.

I was in, how do you say in French, a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad mood.

And then I turned into Jess from New Girl, Monica from Friends and Harry from When Harry Met Sally.

Lesson: Saying your breezy negates the breezy.

Lesson: Harry, you’re gonna have to try and find a way of not expressing every feeling that you have, every moment that you have them.

I don’t have a particular moment from New Girl, but more had that feeling I have for Jess in every episode, but instead of watching TV, I was watching my life. I told a friend this weekend, “nothing that actually upsets me shows up on Facebook,” but this weekend that was a total lie.

The kitchen, the furnace, the marathon traffic and some poor meal planning — all of that was posted on Facebook and all of it combined to my horrible, terrible, no good, very bad day. Maybe it was just due and I needed to have one.

Now it’s Monday. Appropriate apologies have been sent. The cleaners are at my house and I’m waiting for a call from the HVAC guy.