Author: Patrick M. Faller
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Something Nice to Say
My wife uses her pregnant belly — her baby bump — as a table. On it: her iPad. She waves her hand. “Hey,” she says. “Fetus doesn’t like this.”
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A Small Story about Change and Expectation
My wife walks into our living room carrying a bowl of strawberries. Her face and arms are tanned. Her sandy, sun-lightened hair glows. Her five-months-pregnant belly precedes her into the room. The skin is rounded but still smooth and firm, taut from her morning exercise routine; unlike her face and arms, it wears the pinkish…
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Quitter – Part 3
When we’re faced with an ending, I think most of us instinctively recoil. At least initially, there’s some sort of pause before the plunge. We inhale deeply. Then we dive.
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The Experience of Art
Once, a number of years ago, a young woman I knew vaguely through a mutual friend told me that, for her, art always soured after explanation.
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After Listening to My Father Read Aloud One of My Stories
He read the way I’d heard him read aloud from the Letters of Paul, books of the Old Testament. He’d been a lector at church for years; had also spoken in courtrooms, before judges and opposing council, on behalf of clients (I was one, once upon a time); over the public address at Ryan Field, Wapakoneta’s high…
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Attempts (poem)
I must’ve been difficult to handle alone. My kind of trouble makes bones of bodies, sand of bones.
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What One Player-Coach Conversation Taught Me about Transformations, the Uses (and Limits) of Frustration, and When to Let Go of (Some) Authority.
I called the player over after practice had ended. “Do we have a problem?” I asked him. “Do you want brutal honesty?” I said yes, I did. He looked at the empty field, the sky, the fenced horse pasture beyond. Then he started talking.
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Informal Musings on Gift-Giving, Coaching, Teaching, Beating Yourself Up, and Personal Growth
Here’s a story I started writing about a month ago about my wife and tee-shirts. We’re out back on the patio, doing coffee. There’s a breeze cutting the heat of the sun, which keeps slipping out from behind some shuffling cumulus cloud cover. “I think crushed sounds better than broke,” she says.
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Colorings
My wife and I walked our dog a little while ago. She has since gotten back to coloring, a practice she’s taken up with some consistency and considerable joy since her mother and I both gave her coloring books for her birthday.
Patrick Faller 