Uncategorized – The Extrovert Chair

The Extrovert Chair – San Lorenzo Library Edition

I’ll never forget my mom hauling us four kids to the Napa Children’s Library each week. Eagerness made me breathless as I hurried through the alley, lugging the previous week’s pile of books. I’d pause out front and marvel at the library’s cornerstone, which proclaimed the year of the building’s birth in1906. Then I’d enterContinue reading “The Extrovert Chair – San Lorenzo Library Edition”

Winter Bells

For the first time in months, I dragged the Extrovert Chair into the front yard today, and in less than a minute, I was in tears. I guess I’m out of shape. Oscar is a SUPER-friendly man from the Philippines. He gets around on a beat-up bike, and almost always wears flip-flops. He does handy-personContinue reading “Winter Bells”

Extrovert Chair Hits the Road: Back-to-School Edition

Twenty-nine years ago, a student teacher was placed with me. She was skilled in working with curriculum, and my fourth-graders liked her. But one day, she confessed that teaching was much more difficult than she’d realized. “I’m an introvert,” she said. “I’m comfortable engaging with one person at a time, but performing in front ofContinue reading “Extrovert Chair Hits the Road: Back-to-School Edition”

Party Edition

Within the first few weeks of sitting in The Extrovert Chair, I was invited to two parties. One of the parties is a weekly event, and last Friday, I finally decided to go. That day was a particularly fitting one for attending a party of strangers. It was my father’s birthday, and Dad was theContinue reading “Party Edition”

Ana

She found me on Facebook a year ago, this 24-year-old former student of mine. Recently, Ana offered to loan me The Center Cannot Hold (a memoir that the author describes as her “journey through madness”), and I wanted to lend her Children of the Land (a memoir of growing up undocumented). So we met upContinue reading “Ana”

Moments

My husband, John, had a new chainsaw delivered today. When he brought the box inside, he leaned it in the corner of the living room and said, “I’ll put it here for now.” And I said, “But that will make the living room look messy!” The chainsaw is the tall skinny white box in theContinue reading “Moments”

Jose and Oso

As soon as Shelter-In-Place started, I understood: I needed to experience the world as bigger than what was contained inside the walls of my house. So I started sitting outside. The day it occurred to me that I could plunk an empty extra chair 8 feet away from where I sat on the front lawn,Continue reading “Jose and Oso”