GARLAND BREAZEALE heard the front door close as his secretary Nettie Lawrence left the office for the day. Just six months ago, Nettie had become Garland’s first full-time employee. During the previous five years of his law practice in Hampton Falls, Garland had done well to keep a part-time secretary busy. His work then consisted of drafting an occasional will or simple contract. Slowly, he picked up more business as […]
Laura Widener | Harbor from the cold
The diner was a chorus of chatting patrons, clanging dishes, and yelping kitchen appliances when the young man in the tattered coat took a seat at the bar that morning. Baltimore’s winter mornings were unforgiving, and chilled bodies craving warmth occupied most of the diner’s seats. Despite the activity, the waiter behind the bar with the nametag “Eric” noticed the young man instantly: the hair styled in dirt and grease stemming […]
Karl Widerquist | My own private basic income
I have a private basic income – a small, regular cash income without means test or work requirement. It’s probably large enough to meet my basic needs. And I got it thanks to privilege, nepotism, and two big lucky breaks. My first big lucky break happened in 2009 when Georgetown University hired me as a philosophy professor on their campus in Qatar. Georgetown-Qatar, which is funded entirely by the Qatar […]
Joe Cottonwood | Like pigs
It’s Janice on the phone from her sailboat near Madagascar (background sound of waves slapping hull half a planet distant). Her tenants here on this side of the planet have a stopped-up sink, their own fault says Janice because they live like pigs packing five kids into that two-bedroom cottage but I should fix it which is how I meet freckly smiley Georgia who is discretely nursing a blanketed babe […]
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