65 2 2
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“I used to believe in civilization, but now I know better,” Fritz says. We are both standing on ladders, arms stretched up to the ceiling, putting up fresh panels in his flooded basement. My job is to hold a piece of sheetrock against the rafters while he drills…
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6923
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I slept through my first hurricane. Frederic struck late at night, and I was barely five years old and worn out from a long day of trailing my parents as they prepared for the storm--“battening down the hatches,” as they called it.By the time we bedded down in the hallway,…
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8201
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The FEMA man has an electronic clipboard and an electronic pen, and he taps away as I answer his questions. “Robbi your real name?” he says. “Not short for Roberta or Robin or something?” “Nope,” I say. “My name is Robbi.” …
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2320
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Soap operas were about grown-ups, and the people making out in the halls were twelve-year-olds; it was clear from the teachers' and principals' reactions that no one was lining up to put these kids on daytime television.
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17254
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Two summers ago, there was a flickering moment, before my conscience kicked in, when I considered setting fire to this house.
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13833
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I slept through my first hurricane.
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9910
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The Saturday morning before Hurricane Katrina hits, my phone starts ringing before dawn, but I am slow to wake.
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8100
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I was going to explain how it was all pre-planned, how we’d bought the boat for me to live on while she rediscovered herself in the slums of southeast Asia. How she needed to “do her own thing” for a bit, hang with the forsaken souls of the world, h
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2700
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It is like being the Earth, covered with a crust that is miles in depth, trying to explain to a cloud what it feels like to be afraid of your own lava.
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100
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It is like being the Earth, covered with a crust that is miles in depth, trying to explain to a cloud what it feels like to be afraid of your own lava.
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158966
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It drifted into the sea, I say, when you ask me about home. You’ve only known me for a few moments, so you’re not sure how to gauge me. You laugh, and make an Annabel Lee reference. The English teach in me wants to hug you. The New Jersey in me wants
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155210
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But she knew what she would find. She knew it all the moment she felt the sticky fingerprints behind the slat of her old oak slay bed. The fingerprints that would only be left from a person grabbing it from behind their head. The fingerprints that she
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96311
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I took advantage of a free period this afternoon to nap. When I awoke, I tasted blood. My tongue was swollen. I checked myself in the mirror and saw twin punctures on my lower lip with pinpricks of blood on each. I winked at my reflection and lifted my li
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