Easter Ellen

My son kept telling me to “just ask ChatGPT.” So I finally did. Unfortunately, the computer asked me a question back, which was not how I understood computers to work. Naturally, I assumed I had broken it. In this humorous story, I read about my bewildering first encounter with ChatGPT, artificial intelligence, large language models, and the deeply suspicious experience of having a machine attempt...

CONTENT NOTE  Content note: this piece contains scenes of parental panic and distress, and a disaster at sea. It may be upsetting to some listeners. Please take care. EPISODE DESCRIPTION A mother and her fourteen-year-old daughter are aboard a Caribbean cruise when the sea turns against them. But the storm on the water is not the storm that matters. The night before, fear had made the mother cruel...

I Haven’t Had My Coffee Yet I forgot my coffee. That was problem number one. Problem number two was a delightful five-year-old who wanted to discuss an urgent matter on the drive to ballet: How exactly does a person keep all their words inside? What followed was twenty uninterrupted minutes of talking about not talking. As it turns out, some children are born with enough words for an entire neighb...

In this episode, I share an original story called The Teacup Without a Mate . A little girl reaches for a beautiful teacup she was never meant to touch. What follows is a tender story about childhood, mistakes, forgiveness, and the treasures we sometimes protect so carefully that we forget to enjoy them. About These Stories I write stories, reflections, and imagined entire worlds! Some are arguabl...

Sometimes I wonder, when I see the magnificence of sunset, just how God designs it so perfectly every night. This is a short story about the gift of sunset.  About These Stories I write stories, reflections, and imagined entire worlds! Some are arguably true, some suspiciously borrowed from memory, some robustly exaggerated, and some entirely made up from the pure delight of imagining, capturing w...

A tiny fragment of a bright pink eggshell remains on the floor after an Easter morning tradition, carrying with it the memory of one little girl’s magnificent egg, her absolute certainty that it could never break, and the lesson that followed when it did. The Broken Shell is a reflective prose reading by Easter Ellen about childhood, motherhood, memory, and the things we cannot always protect the...