Peter Pavia

    The inside of the place was rinsed in shadow, dust particles swirling in the opaque light. Newspapers were stacked on the counter; a local rag trumpeting rape and murder and a smudged racetrack tip sheet lay nearby. On the wall, a mounted cigarette rack housed... Read More →

  Born around 347 in the ancient city that lies in ruins near present-day Antakaya, Turkey, he might have been called John of Antioch were it not for his celebrated theological thinking, writing, and especially, preaching. Known today as St. John Chrysostom—“Golden mouthed”... Read More →

  A teenager strapped to a backpack reeking of marijuana boards a city bus. The stink permeates the vehicle’s interior the moment the teen reaches the top step. Sneering at the fare box, he walks by the driver and plops into a seat. I guess he doesn’t have to pay. I do, but... Read More →

  Some years ago, twenty-three to be exact—I’m sure because it was the occasion of my wedding day—I received this note: “Hope everything breaks your way.” It was from one of the most generous people I’ve ever known, a man who committed much of his life to splashing money... Read More →

  By the fourth week of January, resolutions made for the New Year are likely to have lost any momentum they might briefly have claimed. Resolutions usually take the nature of goals, and goals are fantasies, which isn’t to dismiss them—daydreams serve a purpose. But I prefer... Read More →

  The embers of an exhausted year—one more Christmas behind us—carry with them a familiar melancholy. The time is bittersweet, if not depressing, and I learned long ago to embrace this seasonal interlude with this thought in mind: The end of anything is hard. Once we lapse... Read More →

  In his 1969 hit “Polk Salad Annie,” singer songwriter Tony Joe White, who also penned the immortal (and more traditional) “Rainy Night in Georgia,” tossed off these kooky lines: “The only thing her brothers were fit for / was stealing watermelons out of my truck patch.” A... Read More →

  Some years ago, twenty-three to be exact—I’m sure because it was the occasion of my wedding day—I received this note: “Hope everything breaks your way.” It was from one of the most generous people I’ve ever known, a man who committed much of his life to splashing money... Read More →

  George Barone came into this world in the dying gasp of the 19th century, sired by the same father, James, as my maternal grandmother Rose. They had different mothers, technically making them half-siblings among the ten or so other children both camps totaled when all was... Read More →

  Who here remembers “two weeks to flatten the curve”? Anybody? How about six feet of social distance to “stop the spread”? And let’s not forget this hoary chestnut: “Follow the science.” All of these were still in vogue—though the bodies stacked outside Elmhurst hospital,... Read More →