The Life of a Circle
A yellow jacket landed on my arm and didn’t sting me. Small wins. I once found a box of blank index cards, and it made my day. I’ve always liked to write. When I first saw graph paper, it was like finding a Playboy in my closet. I’m unaverage.
I sat behind home plate at more than 100 Dodgers games. They had foot-long hot dogs and Cool-A-Coos. Life as a teenager in those years was like a tall Coke. It hit the spot, unless it was flat. Then it was like drinking cough syrup.
I think some people think all writing is about telling a linear story. They must be so confused by these circles I go in about my life. I had a cat named Tiny when I was a baby. Sometimes I like to imagine that Tiny is my cats’ great-grandmother. I don’t even know if Tiny was a boy or girl.
I dated someone I went to high school with as an adult. I couldn’t put my finger on why we stopped being friends in high school. She seemed so cool (hot) as an adult. We dated for nine months. I didn’t have to wonder about that anymore.
People rescue dogs, and it’s great. But I don’t get dog houses. I’ve never seen an actual dog house that looked comfortable. You want your dog to go from berber carpet to plywood? Rude.
Sandwiches are incredible, but when you are an odd bird who doesn’t like squishy sauces to touch their hands, it’s hard to eat a messy sandwich and not get very mad about it. It is absolutely imperative that they put the vinegar on the bread first so it can soak in. Seems kind of obvious to me.
If there was a cookie competition to see which brand I ate more of in the middle of the night when I was a kid, it would be a three-horse race: Mallomars, Oreos, and Nutter Butters. We had this antique cookie jar with blue and yellow swirls in it that I would empty while I was “sleepwalking.”
I once took my kids to an Airbnb in upstate New York for the weekend, and we stopped at a local place to eat lunch. I got what looked like a pretty banging salad, but somehow I spilled the whole thing on my lap. My hand jerked or something. My kids were so embarrassed, but also laughing at me. Still, to this day, when one of us fumbles something, we say, “I saladed it.”
I wouldn’t eat a tomato until I was almost not a teenager. They just looked like they would suck to me. Then I had one. I think I tried every vegetable and fruit for the next year because I didn’t want to miss out on one. Bell peppers also came in as a surprise. I didn’t like cauliflower until this past year. Now I eat it three times a week.
I think it’s harder to run fast on a circular track. If you are just running in a straight line, you can pretend someone is chasing you. Laps are more boring than randomness.
When I moved back to Brooklyn as an adult, I walked my kids to their school under the same awning where I grew up every morning. It gave me a personal jolt of happiness every time. If only my mom were still up there and could come down and walk with us.
© Jonathan Greene, August 17, 2026
