Home  »  Anne’s Diary

You Can’t Go Home Again

September 14, 2011
Thomas Wolfe once wrote a novel titled "You Can't Go Home Again," and with the horrible heat wave going on in Southwest Texas right now, that's how I feel. In his poem "The Death of the Hired Man," Robert Frost... continued

Dirty Windows (and Lights Out)

September 7, 2011
As I write this, the US is just beginning to recover from Hurricane Irene, which swept up the East Coast. While it flooded many small towns in upstate New York and Vermont, and closed down the subways in New York... continued

Hard Work

August 31, 2011
I was delighted to learn that Philip Levine will be our new poet laureate--not only because I love his poems, but because I actually got a chance to meet him when a literary group I worked for in San Antonio... continued

Upon Seeing (and Reading) The Help

August 24, 2011
I read "The Help" when it was first published a couple of years ago. For those who don't know, the book is a pre-Civil Rights story about white southerners in the heart of the South and their black maids (one... continued

When Free, Well-Fed Kids Riot

August 17, 2011
There is rioting in the streets of London, and now it's spread across the ocean to Philadelphia as well. The London (and Philadelphia) riots seem to be about "getting stuff" that advertising and the media have seduced these kids into... continued

Why Do Old Men Send Young Men to War?

August 10, 2011
I was in a doctor's office recently, when I saw, among the various diplomas from medical schools of the physicians in the office, a framed citation from Vietnam, thanking the particular doctor I was there to see. It got me... continued

Getting Hitched

August 5, 2011
Despite the kindle, nook and ipad, Whitley and I still like to read paper, and we buy three newspapers every day--the Los Angeles Times, The Financial Times and the New York Times--and read even MORE of them on weekends, when... continued

Life Upon the Stage

July 27, 2011
I just finished watching the fourth film I've appeared in and as usual, I was somewhat disappointed. It seems like the most important things I have to say are always left on the cutting room floor. In the first film,... continued

Facing It

July 12, 2011
This weekend we went to a wonderful play at a theater that's very near the hospital I was at for 6 weeks in 2004, after an aneurysm burst inside my brain. I was actually "out of it" for more like... continued

It’s Summer–Isn’t It?

June 29, 2011
Human sexuality is supposed to be "seasonless," meaning that people have sex all the time, while animals usually confine this activity to the spring. But most women soon learn that spring affects our males as well--they get a spring in... continued