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

U-Turn

Passing through Christmas, Michigan, I nearly missed the tall, thin man standing on the berm of the two-lane state highway. He held a piece of cardboard “Need Gas” and hugged a little girl. I drove a quarter mile beyond, then made a U-turn. The man ran across the casino’s parking lot to fetch a pick-up truck hitched to a decrepit camper. A young woman sat in the front seat, soda in hand, the girl nestled beside her. “How much?” he asked. “Fill ‘er up,” I said. He was surprised and grateful; so was I when I got the $125 bill.

Catherine Albrecht is a retired historian and part-time writer.

Woodland Ambush

Sans Churro