I was eight years old the first time my mother called me fat. I was living with my mother for the summer, as a reward for her being clean and sober.
Fisher Cats by Marissa Higgins
Category: Essays
An archive of all of the personal essays we’ve published at Hippocampus Magazine over the years.
Crossing Abbey Road by Laurie Baker
Here’s something you might not actually know: Abbey Road is just an ordinary road. Surprising, given the notoriety of that irreverent Beatles album cover of the same name.
With Dogs as My Shepherd by Corinne Heyning Laverty
No dogs allowed. John said they would eat his tortoises. My husband was a whale biologist and many of the former residents of our California beach bungalow reflected this interest.
Chewing Gardens by Mary Lide
I chew the collars of my shirts until they’re ragged as my fingernails. This drives my mother crazier than when I used to chew my hair, which tasted like peppermint despite the fact that I did not use peppermint shampoo.
Blue Rider by Lisa Baird
It begins in the dark of day. It begins with the turn of a key, a familiar road. The commute, the commute of years, begins without fanfare, without manifesto.
Abol Bridge by David Young
“Bobby, it’s me. We hear that you… ran into some difficulty yesterday.” A bit of an understatement, considering he collapsed on the trail and was carried out by a rescue team, but it’s what comes from my mouth.
Universe by Linda Dunlavy
We’re in the forest looking for acorn shells, because they make good bathtubs for the fairies. I have only one daughter, and she thinks a pinecone would be a good hiding place – fairies like to play hide-and-seek.
Take Arms by Matt W Miller
I know as well as anyone the ridiculous, bread and circuses fascination America has with sports but sometimes I just get sucked into its narrative, just like people do with afternoon soaps, teenage vampires, or reality “talent” shows.
Object Lessons by Carol Smith
I wake up sweating and lie there as the adrenaline ebbs, running through what I would take, if I had to leave. The mental cataloging starts: what I have lost already; what I have yet to lose; an inventory of what matters.
The Sound of Ice by Tyler Lacoma
The first sound is the foot sound, the break sound, the cracking crunch that hikers know… It is a stubborn, short sound, underneath your boots. Ka-krack, krunch, it says. It says little else.
