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Employment
Updating My Bio
The Mystical: Leath Tonino is the author of a fragmented novella and 30 billion profound thoughts that blew away on the wind. His work has appeared in snowy fields and dusty canyons, and he has pieces forthcoming on the surface of moonlit lakes. His memoir is currently being translated into stardust and deep-violet silence.
March 2023Sparrow’s Guide To Business
When you walk on sand, you leave footprints. When you work, you leave “workprints.” The people who come behind you will judge you by your workprints.
February 2023Unsheltered
Eric Tars On The Human Right To Housing
The Martin v. Boise decision stands for the very simple principle that punishing a homeless person for undertaking basic, life-sustaining activities like sleeping or sheltering themselves — when there’s no adequate alternative accessible to them — is cruel and unusual under the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution.
January 2023A Sandwich Is A Concept
Our biggest fear was dogs. Ronnie and I looked up dog facts like maniacs. Can dogs smell through plastic? Does the USPS use drug dogs? How do you trick drug dogs? How effective are drug dogs? Are drug dogs a scam that the government uses to justify illegal searches?
January 2023Bottom Feeders
I feel close to Dad on the drive home, our legs mud-dry and tired, the tackle box between us, the pillowcase full of fish and ice. She’ll never admit it, but Mom will be impressed, I’m sure. In a million years she’d never guess how we caught so many. I’ll never tell.
October 2022from Nickel And Dimed
What surprised and offended me most about the low-wage workplace (and yes, here all my middle-class privilege is on full display) was the extent to which one is required to surrender one’s basic civil rights and — what boils down to the same thing — self-respect.
October 2022Learning The Hard Way
Hitching a ride, trusting a partner, marrying the same person three times
September 2022Blue Ladder
My uncle finally kicked me out, and I was living in the twenty-four-hour Kroger on Fairhaven Avenue in Tustin, California, pilfering food and sleeping at the coffee bar. One day Mr. Muniz pushed a cart through the frozen-foods section where I was fanning myself, and he stopped. I’d gotten ugly, my face wasn’t right, and I could tell he was thinking, What the hell?
August 2022Wingtips
On my way home from school / with a gang of friends / I would see him outside / one of the bars or diners / near the Journal Square station: / my uncle, rasping the price / of a shine to the passing crowd
May 2022