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Leaving Our Town
The experience is so deeply embedded that, even now, I occasionally dream about forgetting my lines on stage. I had been cast as Emily in...
Alisa Bair
Sep 13, 20218 min read
18 views
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The road finally taken
“Lisa, Lisa,” she said, her soothing voice rising over her steaming cup. “You may have had your back to your daughters then. But now you...
Alisa Bair
Jun 29, 20218 min read
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The light in our hands
Daughter Leslie texted a photo just after Thanksgiving with, “The gang’s all here!” I immediately recognized the nativity set we’d given...
Alisa Bair
Dec 23, 20203 min read
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"Yet Will I Sing"
In the living room of the modest Dotterer home that cool, autumn evening, I sat across from 55-year-old Ken, listening to him tell me...
Alisa Bair
Oct 20, 20192 min read
76 views
1 comment


"Come Unto Me"
It was late fall, 1979, and Mother Teresa had just been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. I saw her on TV and was so deeply moved I needed...
Alisa Bair
Oct 19, 20194 min read
110 views
1 comment


All I Really Need to Know I Learned From Her Before She Got to Kindergarten
She was born with a voice and knows exactly how to use it. So far, she is the embodiment of much that escaped me in my childhood and that...
Alisa Bair
May 28, 20195 min read
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Filling Her Shoes
This is the set of Hamilton, open to the audience when you first enter the Richard Rodgers Theatre on Broadway. I looked down at my...
Alisa Bair
Mar 12, 20196 min read
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When a Puppy Earns His Soul
He was sitting quietly toward the back of the pen in the barn when we arrived, shy and slightly larger than the others. A barefoot Amish...
Alisa Bair
Nov 22, 20176 min read
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Train Station Encounter
Newark Penn Station, Thursday, July 13, 2:01 PM. The air conditioning must’ve been broken, because the train station was swelteringly...
Alisa Bair
Jul 23, 20174 min read
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“…some place for the singing of angels…”
The night was clear, cold and starry as my husband and I finished dinner near the wharf in Annapolis, Md., and headed down Randall Street...
Alisa Bair
Dec 16, 20166 min read
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With All My Love
It wasn’t exactly ideal weather to begin an October beach vacation. A low pressure system, driven by the northernmost bands of a...
Alisa Bair
Oct 19, 20163 min read
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My Messy Dorm Room
This story ranks up there as one of my top five most embarrassing moments. It was April of my freshman year at a small college in...
Alisa Bair
Sep 16, 20164 min read
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Lady Liberty and The Hemorrhaging Woman
Years ago we were returning from a trip, sailing along the turnpike to music on the radio. As we approached a mountain tunnel, we took...
Alisa Bair
Jun 24, 20164 min read
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Coming Down Out of the Clouds
It’s all over – as ephemeral as a rainbow or the enchanted village of Brigadoon rising out of the Scottish mist for one day every hundred...
Alisa Bair
Apr 26, 20164 min read
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Soup for Everyone
Returning from a long walk this frigid April morning, I unwound my scarf, unzipped my down vest and heard myself say out loud, “What’s...
Alisa Bair
Apr 6, 20163 min read
4 views
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