Carrie Classon

I’ve been under some stress lately. I’ve written a novel, and now I have to wait to find someone who thinks it’s worth publishing. (I happen to think it is, for the record.) So, while I wait, I get more and more nervous. I know all the standard advice for this, and I try to…

I have been trying, for as long as I can remember and with limited success, to learn Spanish. My husband, Peter, says I am good, but that is because he does not speak Spanish, so if I say anything that is understood by anyone, he regards it as a minor miracle. I feel that I…

Verne knows me too well. For the first time in our lives, my husband, Peter, and I live in a building with a front desk. It’s nice to have someone there when packages are delivered, or contractors show up, and this person is usually Verne. Verne is a natural for the job. He knows everything…

It’s that time of year again. No, I am not talking about bikini season. I’m talking about bunion season. I did not even know I had a bunion until fairly recently and now, every time I start wearing sandals again, I am reminded that I do. I imagine it was growing on the sly for…

“You gotta keep poking and clicking,” a friend tells me. “That’s what my daughter does.” By this, she means that learning new technology is not a straight path. I have to play with it. I have to find the process of learning fun and challenging and not get hung up when I make mistakes along…

This time of year still hits me hard. It is the anniversary of the death of my best girlfriend, Angel, who died too young and left an Angel-shaped hole in my life. “Can it be six years?” I ask my husband, Peter, in disbelief. Angel died at 50 years old, six years ago. In the…

“It’s a great time to get old!” That’s what my husband, Peter, says. He’s right. And getting old is—as the saying goes—better than the alternative. I was thinking this while waiting for my father to get a pacemaker. My father had no idea he needed a pacemaker until two days before he got one. They…

“Dress for the job you want!” was advice I heard from an early age. I took this advice to heart. I was working a lowly job in a government office while applying for jobs in businesses around town. I had never worked in business, but I had a freshly minted business degree, so I bought…

The plan was to buy everyone cake. My husband, Peter, and I are finally getting ready to leave Mexico, and we can’t say we are too happy about it. The last two months in San Miguel de Allende have convinced us that it is a place we want to return to, and now leaving it…

I have a weakness for grouchy people. I have a couple of friends I would describe as perpetually grouchy, and I’m not quite sure why, but I think they are good for me. To clarify, I’m not fond of being around people who are in the habit of deliberately messing up their lives. I think…