Essays by Karen Anderson
For 30 years, writer Karen Anderson was a columnist for the Traverse City Record-Eagle. She's contributed weekly essays to Interlochen Public Radio since 2005. Listen for her on Fridays during Morning Edition at 6:32 and 8:32 a.m. Her essays are archived here.
-
I make an appointment with my optometrist, thinking I might need a new prescription for my glasses. I can still read but maybe not quite as easily. The changes are so gradual, I hardly notice.
-
My neighborhood is full of such trees that have survived generations of hand saws and chain saws. Stripped of their symmetry, these trees find another way to be beautiful.
-
My mother would send me into the field behind our house to pick asparagus. We lived in a tiny bungalow, one of hundreds built in a hurry after World War II.
-
The bad news on my radio has turned to good news just beyond my windshield. Then traffic starts moving again and I make my left turn. Grateful—beyond measure—for this delay.
-
“Ask for what you want. No one is likely to offer it.” Rather a stark statement, I thought, but I had to admit it was true. I only wish someone had said it to me years ago.
-
I am looking through my button box and pick up a small cloth-covered button. “Turquoise silk,” I murmur, remembering the dress it came from, a dress I wore only once.