Archive

In the early-mid-19th century the British East India Trading Company maintained large poppy farms and opium factories in India to supply their growing market in China. When the Chinese defended… Read More

NASA defines a black hole as… “a place in space where gravity pulls so much that even light cannot get out. The gravity is so strong because matter has been… Read More

Obesity is a principal driver of health care costs, our nation is obese, and at 350 pounds I, too, am obese. But my doctor tells me that at seventy years… Read More

We look at a stranger and subconsciously register gender, race and perhaps class markers. These reflexive cognitive observations reveal nothing about the person yet often carry heavy judgmental baggage. In… Read More

When I first heard the term “trigger warning,” I imagined Roy Rogers leaning down and whispering something to his horse but I’ve come to understand that the concept is something… Read More

I write in my sleep. It’s hardly restful. Since I mostly remember what I write, I’m never quite sure if I’m really asleep. Recently, I’ve been haunted by the nocturnal… Read More

So the blood of almost 2000 American soldiers shed in Afghanistan has come to this… a new bill passed in the Afghan parliament, although yet to be signed by Karzai,… Read More

In the early 50s, I remember sitting in my PJs under a spruce Christmas tree. I’m opening a pile of presents from my mother. These are the presents my mother never… Read More

For generations, the organizing principles of tribal and melting pot societies have been religion, commerce, and government. Each has occasioned both great human advancement and incalculable human suffering. They are,… Read More

In Denmark, I recently heard the term “curling parents,” the Danish idiom for “helicopter parents.”  For those unfamiliar with the sport of curling, one player runs in front of the… Read More

I love photographs. I have several thousand photographs of family and places from 1868 to the present. I grew up in a family of photographers. Most are black and white.… Read More

Among the common frames through which we view the quality of our lives are health, knowledge, ethics, wealth, beauty, and spirit. A life well lived uses all these frames to… Read More