Estate Sale
Estate sale
By Todd Decker
The Library of Experience
Photo by John Griswold How many times in my life have I worked in that particular position: squatting or kneeling, one hand holding up a heavy piece of furniture or machinery, the other hand using a screwdriver, Allen key, or crescent wrench on it delicately? It is the…
The Terrible Pertinence of the Texas Schoolbook Depository
A man sights out the window at the Texas Schoolbook Depository, Dallas. Photo by John Griswold. I would bet that at least once every day of the week (except Monday and Tuesday), there is a young guy with a beard and wraparound shades on the back of…
Will the Promise at the End of CPAC Hold?
CPAC audience during Donald Trump’s speech, August 6, 2022. Photo by John Griswold Donald Trump’s keynote speech at the end of CPAC (the Conservative Political Action Conference) in Dallas last Saturday ended with a scripted, dystopian litany of all he says is wrong with America under a Democratic…
Carny World: Sideshows, Freaks, Oddities, and Curiosities
In the way that burlesque, roller derbies, and tattooing and other body modifications were reclaimed in the postmodern age (though not without detractors), sideshows and freak shows have tried to become something different than their earlier iterations. Many say they intend to be inspirational, empowering, and to realign conceptions about difference.
Reaching the Climax at CPAC
A superfan at CPAC Texas 2022 waits for the speech by Donald Trump. Photo by John Griswold Protestant services this morning at the Hilton Anatole marked the end of CPAC (the Conservative Political Action Conference ) Texas 2022, which was held in Dallas. The conference itself appeared to…
CPAC and Technology
Metaverse, conservatives, CPAC, paranoia, technology, wireless, Trump, cult
CPAC Day 1
CPAC, Dallas, Sean Hannity, Viktor Orban, conservative, conference, Donald Trump
The Night Before CPAC
CPAC, McCloskey, Trump, GOP, Dallas, elections
The Common Reader at CPAC in Dallas
CPAC in Dallas, 2022, unites Donald Trump and a cast of MAGA characters for a big show in the year of both January 6 and the midterm elections.
Ol’ Blue Rides Again
Photo by John Griswold I suppose I should have known how appealing an old truck would be to some other people by my own reaction when I saw it at the curb. Ol’ Blue, an F-150 from the mid-1990s, was sitting with a For Sale sign in its…
The Great Gift of Time (and Its Proxies)
Photo courtesy National Park Service, via Wikimedia Commons Some of my earliest memories, I realize now, are actually of time. The invisible wind making a wave that approached in the prairie grass; dappled light under the tree that changed with the incidence of the sun. The fatigue of…