Tag: Identity

Take It Easy by Gabrielle Showalter

Everyone figured she would break up with him. She had a swim scholarship to that big school out west, and did he even get in anywhere, anyway? There were jokes he would follow her to college. Set up a sleeping bag outside her dorm. Nah, they’ll be over well before then, people said.

Graduation came, and in pictures he stood off to the side, unsmiling but just within frame.

Keeping Up With The Joanses by Margaret Cahill

You look like a Joan. That’s what Ciara’s flatmate Fidelma said to me one Friday night in The Round House. We’d gone out for drinks after work and Ciara had texted her to invite her along. Ciara’d gone up to get the first round in when she said it.

“Sorry, what did you say your name was again?” Fidelma asked, even though Ciara had only just introduced us.

“Joan,” I replied.

My Name is Jennifer, and I Don’t Have a Legal Middle Name, Either by Jennifer Jeanne McArdle

When my mom was pregnant with me, they asked my older sister what she thought about her sibling still growing in the womb.
“It’s a girl, and her name is Jennifer,” she insisted a few times.
Jennifer is a very common name for girls born in the 70s or 80s. Even in the 90s we had two, sometimes three, Jennifers in my class most years.
But my parents didn’t know where my sister had heard the name. There were no Jennifers on her favorite shows or in her class. Her best friend at the time was a “Valentina”.
Picked it up on the tail-end of its zeitgeist, maybe.
My parents couldn’t consider any other name after I was born.

EXCLUSIVE FEATURE: My Grandfather’s an Immigrant, and So Is Yours by Michael Chin

The following excerpt is taken from My Grandfather’s an Immigrant, and So is Yours”, a novel by Michael Chin (Cowboy Jamboree Press)

Take my middle school American History teacher, Mrs. Flannery. As we approached our study of internment camps during World War II, she asked if my grandfather would be willing to visit and speak to the class regarding his experience.