Educated

injury the doctors said should have killed him. It was the reason Shawn would never quite be Shawn again. If the first fall was ...

ice-blue sofa and pale walls. I smell its sterilized air. I hear the ticking of a plastic clock. Sitting across from me is my fa ...

rejected, and that God would punish me for applying, for trying to abandon my own family. But whatever the outcome, I knew I wou ...

Waiting for Christmas that year felt like waiting to walk off the edge of a cliff. Not since Y2K had I felt so certain that some ...

PART TWO ...

17 To Keep It Holy On New Year’s Day, Mother drove me to my new life. I didn’t take much with me: a dozen jars of home-canned pe ...

Shannon surveyed me with frank disappointment, taking in my baggy flannel coat and oversized men’s jeans. “How old are you?” she ...

I’d chosen it because I’d heard of Shakespeare and thought that was a good sign. But now I was here I realized I knew nothing ab ...

enough. After the quiz, the answer seemed clear: it was not enough. On realizing this, I might have resented my upbringing but I ...

walked away before I could reply. I stayed in my seat until everyone had gone, pretending the zipper on my coat was stuck so I c ...

I awoke with my face pressed to the desk. The room was bright. I could hear Shannon and Mary in the kitchen. I put on my Sunday ...

18 Blood and Feathers After that, I rarely spoke to Shannon or Mary and they rarely spoke to me, except to remind me to do my sh ...

country, not a continent, so very little of what the professor said made sense. And after the Holocaust incident, I wasn’t about ...

Someone but could not have produced Holofernes even if it had been my neck behind the blade. Thirty seconds left. Perhaps I coul ...

One winter, when I was very young, Luke found a great horned owl in the pasture, unconscious and half frozen. It was the color o ...

Dad and I hadn’t spoken since he’d screamed at me about the VCR. I could tell he was trying to be supportive, but I didn’t think ...

“Sure you do!” She held up the thick picture book I’d used to memorize titles and artists. “Oh that,” I said. “I looked at that. ...

19 In the Beginning When the semester ended I returned to Buck’s Peak. In a few weeks BYU would post grades; then I’d know if I ...

remember the days before the accident. Truck, trailer and excavator were totaled. Dad’s determination was etched into his face. ...

In retrospect I’m sure he meant this literally, that he was asking how he could help, but my ears, solitary and suspicious, hear ...