I took a walk today and the trees and the sky and the geese and the translucent air were just spectacular. A glance in just about any direction would pile on heart-stopping reds and yellows and Christmas-tree green and summer-tree green all suspended on an arc of faultless blue. It was stunning. I like it […]
With the recent 20th anniversary of the terror attacks on 9/11, “Never Forget” is everywhere. It’s on signs, T shirts, social media, mugs. It has taken on the aspect of an incantation. But what does it really mean? For anyone in this country who was at least 10 years old on September 11th 2001, there […]
To my middle school son on attending his first Bar Mitzvah, How exciting! Do you feel grown up? You should. Being raised Christian, you may not know that Bar & Bat Mitzvah means son and daughter of the covenant. Judaism can claim a long and rich religious and cultural heritage, and this is the time […]
The Covid Delta variant has driven up cases nationally 200% in the last two weeks. Delta: the 4th letter of the Greek alphabet, nutrient-rich land at the mouth of a river, and Elle Wood’s sorority (with Nu) in Legally Blonde. Benign, right? Yes, until very recently when it has been used to identify a new, […]
Last February I acquired a Black History Month flag at an event in town. I taped it to the railing of my front steps. Then in June I acquired a Pride flag at an event in a nearby town. I taped that to the other side of the railing. At some point, I decided that […]
This week a man gunned down 8 people in Atlanta. They were all hard-working, underpaid women, and most were Asian-American. Following terrorist attacks like this, the media is perpetually focused on motive. It seems like nothing can really be decided about the crime until someone comes up with a reason why it was committed. Why […]
Recently I was stuck in traffic and noticed a bumper sticker on the car in front of me. It read “God Bless Our Troops. Especially the Snipers”. The first part – God Bless Our Troops – okay I get that. Of course we all uphold the courage and sacrifice of the brave men and women […]
Insurrection. Isn’t that what is supposed to happen in countries whose names we can’t pronounce? Or countries we look down upon? That was before. Before January 6th, when there was insurrection in the United States. In the capitol city, Washington DC. In the temple of our democracy, the US Congress. On the other hand, isn’t […]
I was sitting with the African American Mom of a preschooler and we were chatting about kid things. Her family had recently moved and her four year-old son had just begun attending a new preschool. I am White. She was saying that the curriculum and routine were quite similar at both schools, something that had […]
JD Vance’s 2016 bestselling book, Hillbilly Elegy, has been made into a movie. Vance tells his own story, how he survived poverty, with a family history of dysfunction and addiction, and then graduated from Yale Law School. Both the book and the movie have been roundly criticized for their portrayal of generational poverty. Vance’s family […]