I don't remember a word of what was said at my college graduation. I had been at the bar drinking Bloody Mary's since 6 a.m., was force-feeding water to my friend passed out on my shoulder, the sun was blazing and I just wanted President Zingg to...
"It's just so beautiful!" I exclaimed, thinking about the endless sky filled with billowing clouds, the wildflowers and orchards lining the one-way stretch of freeway, the stacked layers of the buttes. Grabbing a drink with a former professor, I was...
After graduating from college in May 2009, I spent five weeks backpacking through Europe (Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Salzburg, London, Munich, Freiberg, Interlaken, Nice) by myself. Although I’d spent a summer in Provence with family friends...
I've seen the San Francisco skyline come into view while crossing the Bay Bridge countless times: as a kid, I loved watching for the Alcatraz spotlight and trying to spot the office building where my grandfather worked. Now, I gaze at the city built...
“It hurts to be beautiful,” my mother told me as I squirmed the first time she plucked my eyebrows. That’s the beauty mantra I’ve grown up with: anything deemed comfortable automatically makes me suspicious. I don’t believe in “travel clothes” and...