Five Minutes explores five minutes of a life in one hundred words. Five minutes is edited by Susanna Baird, with editorial support from managing editor Maria s. picone, newsletter editor kate meen, and founding reader bobbi lerman, plus our rotating team of guest readers, who you can meet in the latest newsletteR. Five Minutes was founded in October 2020, with the Salem (Mass.)-based writing group Carrot Cake Writers supplying the journal’s first pieces. We’d love to read your five. Submit here

Grocery

I was at the Rewe checkout when a mom entered, pushing a cart piled with crates of recyclable glass bottles. Her son pressed on a bottom crate with his toddler legs.

Crash! Smash! Silence. The mom’s face flushed. Her instinct was to shout at the child. I met her gaze with as much kindness as my American face could muster. The boy and I began a game. With each unbroken bottle he placed back in its red, plastic row, I clapped “Bravo.”  Staff swept up the glass. The mom expressed her emotions in German. I expressed my emotions in silence.

Christi Byerly, who’s lived in six countries on three continents, runs Awaken Coaching. Her clients come from all over the globe. 

Looking Good

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