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The Crazy Sex Lady at the Solitary Banquet

By Elizabeth DuffySeptember 28, 2016

“The crazy sex ladies are coming to school today,” said my oldest. “We’re missing it.” “Good,” I said. I was driving the kids to the middle school an hour into their first period class. A glitch in the family routine over the past twenty-four hours prevented any of the three alarm clocks in the house…

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I Have No Idea Where I’m Going

By Elizabeth DuffySeptember 7, 2016

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing…

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Maybe the Kids Will Sleep in Tomorrow

By Elizabeth DuffyAugust 3, 2016

The kids are home for the summer, but my husband has remained on the same schedule under which we operate during the school year, up at 6:30 a.m., fumbling around the room in the dark, until it seems the thought of me still sleeping is just too much to bear, so he turns on the…

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Gotta Dance

By Elizabeth DuffyJuly 11, 2016

My mother was a dancer. I use the term dancer in the most flexible possible way, to mean: “One who dances.” She said that she had always wished to be a ballerina—an image that didn’t compute with my childhood understanding of my mother, a labor room nurse who played racquetball at the YMCA, and otherwise…

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Eden at the Indy 500

By Elizabeth DuffyJune 13, 2016

I managed to live in Indiana for forty years before visiting the Indianapolis 500. A friend offered my husband and me tickets on our anniversary weekend, which also happened to be the 100th anniversary of the race itself, an event that was expected to draw half a million people. “Oh, why do you want to…

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The Prophet of Uninterrupted Complaint

By Elizabeth DuffyMay 23, 2016

I am grateful for deadlines, even when I have little time, or only brief windows of it, which I often manage to fill with reading the Internet. I know my cannons will fire, because they must, but lately I’ve experienced a sort of brain-fatigue, or perhaps it’s peace (I don’t really know the difference), that’s…

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Imitating the Saints

By Elizabeth DuffyApril 7, 2016

St. Therese once wished aloud that her own mother would die. When her mother scolded her, Therese explained that then she could sooner go to heaven. My children received this anecdote with perverse joy, telling their siblings to jump off a bridge, run out in the street, and let go of the tree branch…that you…

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What Happened to Fun?

By Elizabeth DuffyMarch 16, 2016

I was so good, and for such a long time, two weeks at least of decent work and adherence to my schedule. Two weeks of self control, discipline, and a rule—twenty minutes of prayer, ten of spiritual reading, thirty of new writing, one to two hours of old writing and editing, fifteen of cleaning and…

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The Thirst Is Good

By Elizabeth DuffyFebruary 26, 2016

When my husband and I were in the very early stages of our relationship, we both hid from each other that we used tobacco. He chewed. I smoked. But we’d been set up because both of our families were churchy. He thought I was a pious Catholic girl who might be turned off by his…

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The Erotic Powers of the Holy Spirit

By Elizabeth DuffyFebruary 2, 2016

My thirteen-year-old son had seen the Viagra commercials for years, but never understood what they meant, until finally, he asked what Viagra is and does, and I told him. Now he has this new vocabulary that includes the phrase “erectile dysfunction,” and another galaxy of humorous opportunities has opened to him. He begins to explore…

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