Upon This Rock
Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea? Or hast thou walked in the search of the depth? —Job 38:16 The Old Minster at Winchester Cathedral was built in 645 AD. By the year 1000 there was a cathedral there about one-third…
Dispatches
Instagram Museums, the Missouri Edition
Amanda Hess’ September 26 piece for The New York Times was a brilliant and incisive look at how New York’s (and San Francisco’s, to some degree) pop-up-museum scene serves as a great social-media photo backdrop for the younger set. The story embodied American culture’s preeminent desire to…
The Apparition of a Face in the Crowd
I went to a reading the other night for someone I have known for a decade. I call him a friend, but really we are something between Facebook friends and former colleagues who rarely saw each other in person. We have kept in spotty touch, and several times he was…
Consider the Cell Tower
It is easy not to see the landscape in its entirety, but consider too the manmade—the microwave towers, radio masts, and cell towers rising up stiffly in the fields; the lattice pylons, tube towers, and concrete or wood utility poles that help make our electrical grid “the largest interconnected machine on Earth”; guardrails like staples in a wound; 26 million streetlights vying with moon and stars.
Do To-Do Lists Really Work?
This Friday I will venture to a small southern Missouri town (population 586) named Tecumseh, named after the great Shawnee chief and warrior. Almost every spring and fall, since April 2015, I have packed up my compact car and driven to Ozark County for a writing retreat…
Of Focus and Technology
Brace yourself: I have discovered an American middle-class couple who leave their phones on the kitchen table when they work elsewhere in the house or in their yard, and they do not check them when they come back. They also turn their phones off at night, and when they leave…
The Cold (Ancient) Comfort of Beer
Beer has been in the news a lot lately, and not just because a particular U.S. Supreme Court nominee may have enjoyed a cold one, or a keg or two, in June 1982. Stanford University archaeologists near Haifa, Israel have discovered humans may have first started brewing…
Fourteen Ways to Let Go
“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” —Dalai Lama This past week has officially been too much. Hearts and minds are weary, and there is a collective need to press the restart button and let go. Remember:…
Everything Old Must Be Sold Again
In just about every measure the American middle- and upper-middle class act like new money. One need only glance at photos on social media that portray consumption and appearance to see that our culture violates all the “golden rules” —if you…
“The Final Act”
The Final Act | Common Reader: Faces & Places by Donato DiCamillo