Here are some small stories:

“Margaret, could you bring in a jar of pepper jelly from the pantry? I’d like to have some with my toast.” But Margaret was too busy dreaming of the calm flat air of the Southwest to hear the question.

At home, Winnie wondered if applying to grad school was a good idea. After all, she’d failed the GRE and had missed every deadline and none of the people she’d ask to write recommendations were responding to her emails. She felt assured, however, that her entire body was covered in one type of gray material or another. In some ways, this was her grad school application.

Morgan confronted Dean.

“I thought you loved me.”

Dean only shook his head. “I can’t love a woman who wears overalls, Morgan. You knew that about me.”

“But I am also wearing a blazer.”

He threw up his hands and turned away. “That’s not enough!!”

Sloane died of hypothermia this month. Her funeral was attended by her high school biology teacher, his wife Gretta, and no one else.

“Sloane quite frankly did not understand the science of keeping one’s body warm so we we were not surprised to hear of her death from hypothermia. She never once covered her ankles.”

The winters in Oslo are wicked. The heart wants what it wants. The hounds are out tonight. Put on an entire outfit made out of sweatpants.

Sheila hummed to herself on the way to work, “My bag is full of stuff. My bag is full of stuff. There is so much stuff in my bag and it is full of it. Most people never have this much stuff in a bag, but I am excited to say that my bag is full of stuff.”

When she got to her office, she remembered it was Saturday.

Maryann had lots of regrets but nothing was worse than the day she came to pottery class dressed in the same flannel jumpsuit as Nina.

“What have I done... what have I done... who will love me now?”

“What do you mean I’m facing the wrong way?”

Images via Madewell. Contact the author at dayna.evans@gawker.com.