Sara Ryan

They’re playing Bonnie Raitt, not Iron and Wine. The guy at the next table is reading the Bible, not the alt-weekly. But they’ve got soy lattes and free wifi, so here I am. On the way to the coffeehouse, I heard “Blitzkreig Bop” on the radio, repurposed as an Ohio State fight song. O! H! [...]

“…the success of a public library is difficult to measure – circulation statistics and the like tell only part of the story. Such matters are analogous to that part of the iceberg above the surface. The real meaning of the library to its citizens is hidden like the under-water section of the iceberg, and while [...]

I was looking over my last several months’ worth of entries, and found myself more struck by what I wasn’t saying than what I was.
I have a lot of what Garret recently called “breathless blogging type entries” and far fewer longer, more thoughtful posts. Most notably, I’ve never talked about one of the defining facts [...]

I just reread Richard Russo’s Mohawk. Russo is one of my favorite writers, and his usual small-town subject matter fits where I am right now, this blue-collar town, struggling to redefine itself after the collapse of most of the local industry. I’ve never lived here, this place where my parents were born and where they [...]

I quote myself: “As the child of two librarians, one of whom worked in rare books and special collections, I don’t have family stuff so much as a museum and archive.”
So when I’m at my parents’ house, I dig around. This time I found some scrapbooks. Steve wrote about the contents of one of them [...]

I’m still thinking about place.
Where I am now, the overwhelming majority of businesses are national chains. Their existence is described approvingly with definite and indefinite articles, e.g.: “We got a Target,” “The Wal-mart has the cheapest coffee filters.” To urbanite me, these businesses are uniformly bleak and depressing. There’s nothing unique, nothing local, nothing to [...]

My great-grandmother had this chair on her porch:

I don’t know who had this one, which looks like my great-grandmother’s chair’s twin, but it shows up on page 34 of Cottage Living magazine, in their “Fresh Ideas 2007″ issue:

And I was amused, and so I share with the internet.
From this and other recent posts it is [...]

My great-grandfather’s handkerchief box:

He was a farmer, and a lodge member. Inside are two bandanas, various receipts, lodge jewelry, a card from the Maryland Horse and Mule Company, and my favorite item, his business card. It has what I’m thinking is a philosophy of life inscribed on the back:

Kwityourbellyaken.
Y’all — what are your favorite family [...]