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This will post on a weekday, but it is Sunday as I begin writing. Vegetable parings from the past week are in my cast iron pot on the stove. I am filtering water to pour over onion skins and parsley stems—the trimmings of a week of cooking. It became a habit when I was working…
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Even on “reality TV” the firing is done in person. Trump seems to want to play things both ways—hiring and firing at random and then those ousted find out when someone in the news or working in the West Wing takes the trouble to forward a tweet. Really? Is that any way to run a…
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We have this in common. We are wounded. “Many factors determine the severity of a wound, including a bullet’s mass, velocity and composition, and where it strikes. The AR-15, like the M4 and M16 rifles issued to American soldiers, shoots lightweight, high-speed bullets that can cause grievous bone and soft tissue…
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We did not see the film The Darkest Hour until recently. I had concerns about the lead, about the film, and particularly about its subject, the much lionized Winston Churchill. It is one of my nightmares to find myself teaching a subject I know little to nothing about, such as the Boer War. Even so,…
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We went to a promo presentation of Michelle Horgen’s new musical Scarlet at Powell’s Book Store in Portland last month. The songs were beautiful, the brief performances impressive. We drove over the coast range especially to see it. Tickets were on sale at the event, but I’d already bought tickets to the official Opening Night.…
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A dear friend is retiring in June. It will be an enormous change for him and a great loss for his employers—far greater than they appreciate, I suspect. My husband and I have experienced our own great changes. Both of us are retired, though Gary teases me that I will never retire from teaching. The…
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We’ve seen a lot of films this past year, most of the Academy award nominees before Oscar night and others in theaters or on DVD. We didn’t get to everything. We still have not seen the sequel to Bladerunner or the animated features or the documentaries, but these will come to us eventually through Netflix.…
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“I heard a woman becomes herself the first time she speaks without permission,” says poet Denice Frohman in the first line of Twitter’s new #HereWeAre campaign, which made its TV debut tonight during ABC’s Oscars telecast. The brilliant video was the best thing on the Oscars. I hope no one minds me linking to it and…
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When I teach, I strive to give my students guidance and support as they become independent thinkers and writers. I am not always successful. Objective research, evaluating the credibility of sources, and teasing out the truth from propaganda and prejudice—this process is not automatic, but the result of trial and error and direction from family,…
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