Shame

I’m not always proud of my thoughts and feelings. Some of them are disgusting.

I blush with embarrassment when I make you laugh.

Does the word “mania” mean what you think it does? Here’s what it means to me.

A reader doesn’t like my writing, doesn’t like me. But keeps coming back. I respond.

I went to a bar mitzvah and had thoughts I couldn’t un-have.

The distance between who I am online and who I am in the world protects me from more than I like to admit.

A man at the bottom of a stairway, looking up. I saw myself in him.

A twelve-year-old boy, a closet, a cousin with breasts, and the indelible shame of getting caught — plus some thoughts on what we owe the teenage boys who do creepy things.

Descending a particular stairway at a particular subway station, I didn’t remember how I used to feel. I felt it.

Shame lives in my body — hot, constricting, brutal. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.