dervala.net

Slides

dervala — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:34:13 +0000

“It lets us travel the way a child travels…round and around, and back home again, to a place where we know we are loved.” —Don Draper, pitching the Kodak Carousel on Mad Men. I remember playing with the yellow plastic boxes, and my father saying, “Don’t put your paws all over the slides.” I used to hold [...]

Green Card

dervala — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:29:43 +0000

I’ve worked with my immigration lawyer for 12 years now, and no one knows more about me than Ken. He may not know what makes my heart beat faster (too much red wine and coffee, Ken), but he has the facts. He has an original copy of my Leaving Cert results, and he knows the exact [...]

The Inevitable Evolution of Love

dervala — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 00:03:32 +0000

“On election day itself, as the state of California determines whether to make one last-ditch effort to hold back the inevitable evolution of love in the 21st century, Julie and Amy decide to get hitched (again). It is an act of love but also of protest, an affirmation of commitment but also a land-grab [...]

C.A.L.I.*

dervala — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 06:23:39 +0000

“Studies reveal that most married couples start out happy and then become progressively less satisfied over the course of their lives, becoming especially disconsolate when their children are in diapers and in adolescence, and returning to their initial levels of happiness only after their children have had the decency to grow up and go away.” [...]

Opening

dervala — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:55:49 +0000

It’s 1998. My father is reading the paper on the couch in my New York apartment, and my mother stands behind him concentrating on his head. “I’m trying to open Daddy’s chakras, but he won’t really let me,” she says sadly. “Would you ever leave my chakras alone, woman?” he says, and keeps reading. Ten years later. I’ve [...]

Life Beyond Screens

dervala — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 04:41:45 +0000

In 1985, more than half of Americans said there was someone they could confide in. By 2005, fewer than 1 in 4 said this was true for them. The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run. —Henry [...]

Peckerhead

dervala — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 04:35:05 +0000

Like the devil, our rooster had many names. Tim called him Peckerhead, which I found disrespectful. Once or twice I called him Bill O’Reilly, for his bombast, but that was trying too hard. We called him Tinpot, for his dictatorial strut. Ong Bok-bok-bok, for his Thai kickboxing skills. El Gallo, for his machismo. Foghorn, for tradition. [...]

A wedding

dervala — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 23:14:47 +0000

Photo by Tim Vetter Everyone danced at my sister’s wedding. The wedding singer was once the black-haired lead in our school plays, three years ahead of me. By now he had dropped the Sixth-Year poses and his hair was grey, but all the years of leppin’ to Chuck Berry and Van Morrison and Neil Diamond had kept [...]

Dough

dervala — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 18:41:42 +0000

I’m making French bread to go with breakfast eggs from Cleo the chicken. I’ve never worked with yeast before. It breathes, it stretches, and it smells like a sleepy lover—how could you not say good morning to such a substance? Tim makes fun of me when I wake up my dough with flour and water, [...]

Anaheim, California

dervala — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 18:21:40 +0000

“The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.”—Samuel Beckett, Murphy “Welcome to John Wayne International Airport. The current Homeland Security threat level is Orange. To enhance your safety, and to avoid transporting dangerous goods, please do not leave baggage unattended. Please report suspicious or unattended packages to law enforcement personnel.” “We have a high degree [...]