Allowing Syrian refugees into our country will change the way many of us live. So will wrestling with gun violence, and police shootings, and rape culture, and immigration. We’ve done it a few times before: When we recognized the right of gay couples to marry. When we ended the Cold War. When we recognized a […]
We all have circumstances in our lives that we didn’t cause. It’s not your fault the economy crashed. It’s not your fault you can’t get the war out of your head. It’s not your fault you got cancer. It’s not your fault your dad hit you, or that thug robbed you, or some guy decided […]
This is my first post for the Your Turn Challenge. Every day for the next seven days, I will post here. Progress toward my goals: Marathon: On Track. I started week two of the Couch to 5K program this morning. I’ve managed to suck my son in; he ran with me this morning, and says […]
In two weeks, three courageous men will receive Medals of Honor they earned years ago. On the 15th of September, President Obama will award the Congressional Medal of Honor to three former soldiers: Command Sergeant Major Bennie G. Adkins, Specialist Donald P. Sloat, and First Lieutenant Alonzo H. Cushing. Of the three, SPC Sloat’s action […]
I can’t let Dr. King’s day go by without posting something in his honor. His very name inspires visions of courage: not the swaggering bravado of the nineteenth century, nor even the forward-at-all-costs determination of the industrial-age soldiers we came to admire in the twentieth. Martin Luther King’s courage was something different. It’s one thing, […]
We’re fascinated with what came before us. We go to museums to see how people lived long ago. We flock to movie theaters to see historical films like Lincoln and Gladiator. We’re fascinated with old cars, old clothes, old hairstyles. When we tell stories, we almost always tell them in the past tense, as though […]