Some people escape to lake houses, some to cabins in the mountains, others to villas overseas. Me? When I want to get away by myself, I splurge on a fancy hotel. What luxury — a plush robe waiting for me, my bed gets made every morning, clean towels magically appear in the bathroom, and when […]

Hey, it’s time to sign up for the 2015 Northwestern Summer Writers’ Conference, a three-day institute at the end of July that’s dedicated to the creation and revision of novels, short stories, nonfiction, and poetry. From their web site: The program is tailored to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and levels of experience, and welcomes […]

A writer in the Monday memoir-writing class I lead grew up in Germany, came to America through a study abroad program at Vassar, and stayed. Brigitte has retired from a career in academia now, and twice a week she volunteers in a third-grade class at a Chicago Public School. Nearly all the students in Brigitte’s […]

The first Chicago high school built to serve an exclusively African-American student population opened its doors in 1935, and Wanda Bridgeforth, a 93-year-old writer in my Wednesday memoir-writing class, was a freshman there that year. Wanda swells with pride any time DuSable High School is mentioned — her Class of ‘39 was the first to […]

You might remember my post about Laura Martinez, a blind woman who graduated from Le Cordon Bleu and worked at Charlie Trotter’s here in Chicago until the five-star restaurant closed in 2012. After two frustrating years trying to persuade another restaurant to hire her, Laura has opened La Diosa, her own restaurant at 2308 N. Clark in […]