It goes without saying that our society is obsessed with youth. As a person who feels 16-24 internally, but is pushing half a century externally, this is constantly drilled into my head.

The two most famous people I have met in person and talked to are James Earl Jones and George Jones.

I have never wanted children. Yes, I had baby dolls, including my beloved Pebbles who stuck with me through a terrible haircut, having her arm ripped off by my brothers, losing her clothes, and eventually being rehabilitated at the Doll Hospital in Bell Buckle at the insistence of my grandmother. But Pebbles was a doll, not a living child.

One thing my father and I both learned the hard way was to never ask my grandmother for something we didn’t really want.

I love to watch Dateline, and every time I do, I jokingly wonder aloud to my husband if this will be the night we would finally see the episode on my brother Tom.

During my junior year abroad in Germany, I received a letter from a person I didn’t know. It was very thick and the return address was a prison in Nevada. I was intrigued, but also concerned. How in the world would someone in a Nevada prison get my mailing address in Germany?

And then I remembered my brother Tim.