“This Is Personal. And No, We Are Not Criminals”
Two accomplished, compassionate healthcare professionals describe what it took to get here as refugee kids—and how it feels to be here now.
By Jeannette Cooperman
Finally, an Explanation for the Paradox of MAGA Christianity
For a decade now, a lot of Americans have gone slightly crazy trying to reconcile Christianity with the policies and goals of MAGA. Tim Alberta explains.
How to Ignore the Crumbling of the Body—and the Body Politic
What does “crumbling” mean anyway? “Breaking or falling apart into small fragments, especially as part of a process of deterioration…. Disintegrating.
Why Pink Is So Complicated
I felt strong, refusing the Barbie color. But I denied myself too lavishly.
Exercising the Prayer Muscle
Prayer attempts to control—or at least come to peace with—the uncontrollable. It is an aspiration but also an assent: you are believing in something, acknowledging something, hoping for something. You have given shape to what is amorphous and uncertain. Psychologically, prayer is a survival tactic.
We Owe Our Lives to Some Bugs that Ate the Sun
For ten points, name the central event in the history of life.
Ten Rules for the New Administration…from the Emus
In the first official inter-species war on record...the emus won. Our new president might want to heed their advice.
Pathologize Hardship, and the Rest of Us Are Off the Hook
We have been made to feel fragile. But life is hard and precarious, and that is not an automatic risk for mental illness.
The Headband Makes a Comeback
Trained to respect a look that requires, then conceals, significant effort, women learned to mistrust anything that was just plain easy.
My Friend Chooses How and When to Die
Hope changes form as we age. We are no longer hoping for new things or adventures or lovers or careers. We are not “living for” any particular cause or project. We are simply living. Hope is now a compact with the universe: a resolve to keep trying, keep giving, keep reaching out. So when the world tells us it would rather we die already, that we are about to become a great deal of bother, why would we not bow out gracefully?
The Age of Subtraction
She bought Stephen Sondheim a bottle of the best gin--then saw him pouring white wine. This was, they sighed, the Age of Subtraction.
The Mouse That…Squeaked
I call out the list of what not to feed a mouse. No rhubarb. No raisins or onions, no fizzy bubbles, no caffeine. Definitely no booze. Which is a shame, because I bet she would be even cuter tipsy.