One day it dawned on me that my eighth-grade teacher was a phony. He was a decent person, I suppose, but he was young and insecure in his first year of teaching.

A number of years ago comedian Billy Crystal had a running gag portraying Fernando, a quintessential Hollywood character. Crystal would come on talk shows and greet the host with an enthusiastic, "You look mahvelous!"

Mr. Cardinale was rehearsing his lines in his mind. His daughter had missed curfew once again, and she'd already been warned. How often had he told her about curfew-rule number one?

I met a community organizer at a number of meetings in the neighborhood. I liked her style, so one day I asked her how she had gotten into her profession. She spoke of her idealism in college, but that it was mostly talk and little action.

Not long ago I attended a funeral for a man who had served as a journalist for the diocesan paper for more than 25 years. Kevin was all that one would hope and trust a journalist might be: inquisitive, persevering, intelligent, and articulate.

I heard a little girl in the grocery store pleading with her mother. “Please, please, please buy me the pink cookies!” she wailed. And then she decided to set the trap.

Kelly, a teenage girl on vacation with her parents, was having a horrible time. And her face and her posture let everyone know it. All week long she'd moped by the resort's pool—alone with her cellphone.

"I can't get enough people to become lectors and eucharistic ministers," a director of religious ed and ministry recently lamented. "I put notices in the bulletin; the pastor invites people from the pulpit; I ask people directly; and the answer is always the same: 'Gee, I'd love to but I'm just too busy.'"

My favorite and least favorite part of my house, until recently, was the front porch. It’s almost flush with the sidewalk, with only about a foot of dirt in between.

Years ago, I visited some friends who were living in California. Instead of taking me on the usual tour of the popular wineries with their famous names, we went down the back roads to some of the oldest wineries in the state with vines that were planted more than a hundred years ago.