HeyJaredA Million Stars, A Million Wishes
Essays and observations about parenting, relationships, teaching, writing, animals, and nature
- Indexed issues, last 90 days
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- Sep 12, 2026
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- Jul 29, 2026
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The Better Heart (opens the original)
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A quarter century ago, I was two years into a teaching career and walking to class on a Tuesday morning when a student grabbed my arm and said, “A plane just crashed into the World Trade Center. Can we turn on the TV?”“It’s not that kind of TV,” I said, thinking nothing else of her request as I closed the classroom door. When, 75 minutes later, I stepped onto the colonnade overlooking the campus pecan grove, it was into a whole different world. ~~If I look at the global events that have marked m
A Little Relief (opens the original)
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My daughter went back to college last week, which feels like somebody lifting a boulder off my back and simultaneously amputating a limb. The summer tips towards fall, and that, too, is full of relief and grief. I used to hold summer up as the most beautiful, magical time of year: three months of my favorite things. But this year I felt an undercurrent of agitation. Everything in overdrive. The tumult of purposelessness. The hustle of filling time.The grass grew so much we could almost hear it o
Trust and Follow (opens the original)
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I get up early, the only bearable time of an August day in Virginia, and walk down the back pasture to catch my horse, lead rope swinging in my hand. The horses are usually hanging out by the barn first thing, but they are as far away as possible on this day. The walk slows my mind a little. I think about all the times I’ve done this in my life, heading out to catch one of the many horses who have come and gone.I remember a picture of me at sixteen, bringing in a chestnut mare and foal, her on o
Bubbles (opens the original)
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I’m at my dad’s house in Scotland. It used to belong to my grandmother. On my walk here from the train station yesterday, I passed the old village hall where she met my grandfather, an RAF airman who didn’t like to dance, at a dance.I have been thinking a lot lately about my grandmother, the most vivacious and positive person you could ever meet, because she cared for her elderly mother with no help from her siblings, just as I find myself doing now.These are heavy days. I have to remind my mom
But It Is June (opens the original)
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“That’s the most Alexandra story I’ve ever heard,” my husband said at that familiar intersection of affection and exasperation. I had just returned home from a week-long writers’ workshop on Martha’s Vineyard where I’d gotten lost exploring the island one day.I started the week standing at the railing on the ferry from Woods Hole to Vineyard Haven remembering the last time I’d been there—for a different workshop 25 years earlier. I thought about my then-roommate, an older woman who wore Crest Wh
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