Elvira Cordileone

What follows is a series of diary entries from my early twenties—years shaped by my Italian parents’ expectations, Quebec’s cultural upheaval, and my own struggle to claim a self. This “almost” relationship, the failure of hoped for young love with a fellow student seems trivial on the surface, but at the time the pain of rejection cracked something open in me: the realization that my disappointment with men was tangled up with deeper questions about belonging, trust, and how much of myself...

I wrote the very short story appearing below in the 1970s. I based it on my observations of a married middle-aged couple who'd befriended me. When I met them, they'd lived together for almost thirty years and had produced two adult children. They spoke to each other only to communicate about practical things. They never looked at each other in the eyes. Although they behaved politely enough, hostility stood between them like a third person. At the time, I judged them harshly for staying...

I spent my my youth alone, watching life go by The excerpts below are diary entries I wrote in the fall of 1972.  Two months earlier, I had celebrated my twenty-third birthday. As I reread what I wrote long ago, it surprised me how well I understood that my fears were smothering me. I knew I had to defeat them but had no idea how to do it. I tried changing jobs or moving to a new apartment. I even tried moving across the country, thinking a fresh start in a new city would help. Shaking...