Educated

I remembered the drama of Peter’s birth: how he’d slipped out of Emily weighing little more than a pound; how he’d been such a s ...

shadow. Mother had seen me take my journals to the car. She must have known what that meant, must have sensed the farewell in it ...

between me and them, between me and the rest of the family. And from Audrey I had learned: he would not choose me. My fellowship ...

One evening, I got into an argument with a friend about something trivial, and before I knew what was happening I had pressed my ...

38 Family I was failing my PhD. If I had explained to my supervisor, Dr. Runciman, why I was unable to work, he would have helpe ...

Tyler was still reeling from Dad’s threat when his phone rang. He thought it was Dad calling to apologize, but it was Shawn. Dad ...

I clicked the mouse, the attachment opened. I was so far removed from myself that I read the entire letter without understanding ...

Winter was long that year, the dreariness punctuated only by my weekly counseling sessions and the odd sense of loss, almost ber ...

As I walked home carrying the heavy manuscript, I remembered attending one of Dr. Kerry’s lectures, which he had begun by writin ...

39 Watching the Buffalo It was spring when I arrived in the valley. I drove along the highway to the edge of town, then pulled o ...

We sat in the living room; the carpet was the same crisp white from my childhood. The visit was short and polite. He talked abou ...

same terms they had offered me three years before: that I trade my reality for theirs, that I take my own understanding and bury ...

money. The house was massive. The home I’d grown up in had had five bedrooms; now it had been expanded in all directions and loo ...

It was a bright May afternoon when we all piled into a large van and set off on the hour-long drive. I was uncomfortably aware t ...

Shawn arrived a few minutes before the service, with Emily and Peter and a little girl I had never met. It was the first time I ...

40 Educated When I was a child, I waited for my mind to grow, for my experiences to accumulate and my choices to solidify, takin ...

make out his tender qualities. When he was before me, towering, indignant, I could not remember how, when I was young, his laugh ...

Acknowledgments To my brothers Tyler, Richard and Tony I owe the greatest debt for making this book possible, first in the livin ...

Notes 1 Except for my sister Audrey, who broke an arm and a leg when she was young. She was taken to get a cast. 2 While everyon ...

this account, it was then that they feared for his life, and that is when my sister called me, only I misunderstood and assumed ...