I recently worked a summer job picking a niche berry called “camerise”, or haskap in English. They are a faded blue when still plumply attached to its branch, but turn a deep purple once touched (or pink to light purple, if they are not yet ripe). Sometimes, after hours of picking, they begin to remind…

At my hostel in New Orleans, as I sat huddled against the brisk evening winds clutching a cheap beer in my right hand and listening to the sweet sounds of jazz emerging from the impromptly put together stage to my left, I begun to question whether I had ever actually thought about the realities of…