The River, the Railroad Bridge, and the Man with a Knife

The River, the Railroad Bridge, and the Man with a Knife

The air was so cold that it felt like my lungs would crack when I breathed. We were rushing from the car into the street. Four white-trash, teenage punks on a Friday night rampage. Out onto the icy blacktop of our Central Minnesotan wasteland. Into the freedom of...
How I Became an American Ghost in the Czech Highlands

How I Became an American Ghost in the Czech Highlands

On my final day living in the Czech Highlands, yellow light from the train station hovered over the snow falling on the tracks. It was a cold December night, and my friends had kept me out drinking until the last train left Havlíčkův Brod at midnight. I found a car...
Tedium – The Bartendress in the Center of Nowhere

Tedium – The Bartendress in the Center of Nowhere

Numbed and on edge after surviving the drive through a night of torrential rain, with lightning piercing through the dark like a strobe light in a throbbing dance club, Jarette had arrived in Middlegate, Nevada. A speck in the center of nowhere. My mind feels like...