erin ahnfeldt

Listening to Life

Crossing Whitewater

Crossing Whitewater

Jeremy looked down at his phone, sitting in the back of room 212, his brow furrowed.  He had no words for anyone.  His classmates busily flipped through notes one last time and practiced reciting their poems.  From my perspective sitting at my desk, Jeremy looked...
The Glass Cage

The Glass Cage

I struggle with anxiety.  Sometimes it feels like I’m trapped like my pet lizard, Spike, baking under a heat lamp in a glass cage.  But in those moments, my cage doesn’t have a screen top; it’s solid glass, and I can’t breathe.  Anything can set it off.  A bad...
The Rescue

The Rescue

Anxiety is a difficult thing to shake. It sneaks up on me when the bus headed to camp is ready to go, engine humming, and I realize my wife drove off with my suitcase. It’s there when an administrator takes a seat in my classroom. And it screams at me when my...