I won’t write about the conflict. Yes, I know I’m from there. I know I must have Such Interesting Perspectives on that whole…situation. I know I have friends in the IDF. I know I once strongly considered moving back, and thus getting drafted myself. I know I’ve seen rubble and remains of Qassam rockets and …
Category Archive: essays
Apr 24 2012
Leaving Medill
I knocked on the office door promptly at noon. She opened the door and said, “Can you just wait a few minutes? Our teleconference is running late.” I nodded. The door shut. I waited. Twenty minutes later, I was sitting at a round table in a large, airy office full of plants. It had two …
Feb 24 2012
Days I've Been An Adult
[TMI Warning] According to our culture and our legal system, I just became an adult. That is, I just turned 21. Happy birthday to me. Although 18 is the age of majority, 21 is the age at which we gain control over our own bodies by getting the legal right to pump them full of …
Dec 17 2011
I Love My Body
[TMI Warning] I’m going to say something women aren’t supposed to say–I love my body. My favorite part of my body are my shoulders. I’m not entirely sure why; it’s an irrational feeling. During the summer I like to show them off as much as possible with halter-top shirts and dresses. I also love my …
Oct 12 2011
You Can Leave
[TMI Warning] You’re allowed to leave. You’re allowed to walk away from things that hurt you. Nobody ever tells you that, so I will. ~~~ Tonight should’ve been a great night. SHAPE, a campus organization that I’m involved with–it stands for Sexual Health and Assault Peer Educators–was holding an event in which a documentary filmmaker …
Aug 29 2011
The College Story
I wish I could spin you the story everyone wants to hear. That story has a whole cast of predictable characters, and many trunks’ worth of familiar props. The friends, the neat dorm rooms, the beer, the photo collages, the inside jokes, the cute frat guys, the walks by the lake, the hot chocolate, the …
Aug 11 2011
How Depression Feels
I feel like there’s a disease in my head. I want to excise the brain parts that it lives in, the parts responsible for loneliness, worthlessness, apathy, cynicism, seriousness, sensitivity, and all the other ways in which I could be described. I feel like a book lying open on the grass. The wind blows the …
Aug 04 2011
Dancing With Myself
[This is a piece I wrote in response to a prompt at Open Salon and just thought I'd repost it here.] You aren’t really a daughter of Russian parents unless they make you do ballet. Mine did, though I started later than most–when I was five years old. I continued until I was fifteen. Over …
Aug 03 2011
I ♥ NY
Consider this a love letter to my favorite city. New York City was the first bit of America that I ever saw, fourteen years ago when my family immigrated from Israel. I can only imagine how my parents felt. They had escaped from social and religious oppression when they’d left Russia, and now, two casualties …







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