Photo courtesy of Lenny Gotter. Two weekends ago, I got sick. I slept most of Sunday. When I wasn’t asleep, I was reading a sociology book about how experiences like medicine, illness, and death are constructed by social and cultural factors. It’s called Medicine as Culture  by Deborah Lupton. For a scholarly work, it’s very readable.    I grew immersed in the book as if I were reading a sci-fi adventure. I almost felt like I was reading for escape, except the escape was a tapestry of...

Photo courtesy of Lenny Gotter. Four years ago, our friend Jacque came to visit from Chicago. During her stay, she and Kara started talking about a new routine for her air guitar persona, Jessie Spandex. The character was inspired by caffeine-pill-popping overachiever Jessie Spano—played by Elizabeth Berkley in the '90s teen sitcom Saved by the Bell . Berkley later became famous as Vegas dancer Nomi Malone in the notorious camp classic Showgirls. By the end of her visit, Jacque had a concept...

Photo courtesy of James Butler Some months ago, my former neighbor came by to do some landlord work on his old house. While we caught up in the driveway, his five-year-old daughter played nearby. Eventually, she came up to me and said: "Are you sad that Kara's dead?" She was smiling. Not just smiling, but almost giggling . I smiled back. In a flash, I saw her father, well over six feet tall, reduced to a heap of ashes in a wooden box. (I have a few such boxes myself.) And I saw her reduced to...