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

Suburban Sins

I’m sitting on my front porch, knitting. He doesn’t see me, the dog walker. Not yet. His beagle is cute and leashed, but the leash is long and lets the beagle snuffle the grass that I faithfully mow and religiously water. There are no dandelions. I’ve excommunicated each one, that ritual aching my back. The beagle squats on my grass and pisses, pisses, and pisses, right where my toddler sometimes sits. “Asshole!” I shout. He yanks the dog’s leash, pulls the dog off my grass, shoots me his middle finger, and ambles away. No mea culpa from him. Or me.

Marie Anderson is a Chicago-area married mother of three.

Another Shift

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