Steve Almond
Steve Almond
Steve Almond is an American short-story writer, essayist and author of ten books, three of which are self-published...
beginning boston came candy century city companies freak half home million national per rise sales twentieth
The first half of the twentieth century was Boston's freak zenith. The city was home to 140 candy companies by 1950, with sales of $200 million per year. The beginning of the end for Boston came with the rise of the national candy conglomerates: Hershey's and Mars.
meant nut strange
I was saddled with this strange name, which meant that I was constantly, constantly, being serenaded with the Sometimes you feel like a nut Almond Joy/Mounds jingle.
beautiful both candy chocolate craziest egg gotten inside strikes trouble
The craziest Peep-related candy I've ever gotten is a chocolate egg with a Peep inside it. Someone went to a lot of trouble to make that, which strikes me as both beautiful and pathetic.
chewing coconut flavor texture troubles
It isn't the flavor of coconut that troubles me, but the texture I feel as if I'm chewing on a sweetened cuticle.
beautiful earth final halloween haul
Nothing on Earth so beautiful as the final haul on Halloween night.
ate kept kid
If I had been the kind of kid who kept a diary, the entries from the years 12 to say, 16, would have to read: Got high, ate candy.
crush song religious
It's like this when you fall hard for a musician. It's a crush with religious overtones. You listen to the songs and you memorize the words and the notes and this is a form of prayer. You attend the shows and this is the liturgy. You're interested in relics -- guitar picks, set lists, the sweaty napkin applied to His brow. You set up shrines in your room. It's not just about the music. It's about who you are when you listen to the music and who you wish to be and the way a particular song can bridge that gap, can make you feel the abrupt thrill of absolute faith.
children holiday stranger
There's something incredibly liberating about a holiday that encourages children to take candy from strangers
kindness mistake facts
To look at the work of your peers, and learn how to explain with kindness and precision, the nature of their mistakes is, in fact, how you learn to diagnose your own work.
fun dad people
Why are people so fascinated by how to eat Valomilks?’ She said, ‘Well, Dad, they’re round and they’re messy. But that’s what makes them fun. Once we get older we’re not supposed to be messy anymore. But for one moment when you’re eating a Valomilk, it’s okay to be messy again.
powerful political lazy
Our lazy embrace of Stewart and Colbert is a testament to our own impoverished comic standards. We have come to accept coy mockery as genuine subversion and snarky mimesis as originality. It would be more accurate to describe our golden age of political comedy as the peak output of a lucrative corporate plantation whose chief export is a cheap and powerful opiate for progressive angst and rage.
heart men soul
I love men, the restlessness of their corrupted souls, the way they hide their heavy, murderous hearts, their sudden delicacies and small shocking acts of tenderness.
children hard-times cracks
I have a hard time defending the production of candy, given that it is basically crack for children and makes them dependent in unwholesome ways.
art real struggle
But the real life of a writer resides in showing up at the keyboard every day, with the necessary patience and mercy, and making the best decisions you can on behalf of your people. It's a slow process. It often feels hopeless, more like an affliction than an art form. Most of us will have to find our readers one by one, in other words, and against considerable resistance. If anything qualifies us as heroic, it's that private perpetual struggle. Put down that magazine, soldier. Forget about the other guy. Remember who you are.