Regardless of your opinion of Ted Kennedy, this eulogy by his oldest son is something you won’t soon forget. I heard it today, on my father’s 81st birthday, while driving home from Seattle. Hard to see the road through tears.
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Leave it to a child to ask an existential question that reverberates louder than the Pacific surf: Will there still be waves if everybody’s dead? Atticus, in the midst of his first beach vacation, received a truthful answer — and a question. Why did you wonder such a thing? Silence, except the sound of waves […]
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Our son Atticus, now 4, watched part of Finding Nemo tonight. The story’s setting was relevant given the roaring surf outside our rented vacation house on the Oregon coast. Judging from his reaction to the dramatic scenes (shielding his eyes with a blanket and whimpering occasionally), we’ve overly sheltered him from TV and other insidious […]
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Thinking about the universe is like staring at the sun. One has to quickly turn away from the incomprehensible vastness; the combined sensations of insignificance and loneliness are too much to bear. Oddly, this video graphically illustrating the vastness makes it less painful to contemplate. But the 3-D effect of drifting past uncountable galaxies is […]
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There was a time in this country when journalists lived to expose politicians’ lies. Today, however, some let politicians trample the truth unchallenged just when the public most needs the straight story. I’m speaking of the ludicrous claims that health-care reform proposals would establish “death panels” and give the federal government access to peoples’ bank […]
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Fame for a day, judging from this review of the book I co-authored. Observing reaction to Pendleton Round-Up at 100: Oregon’s Legendary Rodeo has been gratifying. Readers and reviewers like it so far, including those on Amazon, where I’ve cajoled no one to plant praise. Granted the book’s approach doesn’t invite criticism. While not rah-rah, […]
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I saw my heart beating today from behind its walls. In darkened chambers easily mistaken for underground rooms, a handful of workers labored without pause. The workers are valve gates, flanges of flesh regulating blood flow with relentless precision. It’s easy to see why one day they might quit from fatigue or boredom. But one […]
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The last European survivor of World War I has died at age 111. Harry Patch’s late-life interviews are cautionary. Reading this story, I’m struck by a glaring hole: unmentioned is why nations sent millions to be slaughtered. A close friend of Patch said the veteran stressed two messages: “Remember with gratitude and respect those who […]
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I hope Roger Cohen of the New York Times wins a Pulitzer Prize for his remarkable commentary from the streets of Tehran. (He discusses the coverage here.) But world-stage politics aren’t his only topic. Yesterday’s gem, “The Meaning of Life,” uses a study of monkeys’ caloric intake to explore universal themes. And his image of […]
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For two weeks the broccoli heads stood like princes of the garden, waiting for a kitchen coronation. The wait was too long. Hordes of aphids stormed the cedar-plank box from which the broccoli grew and blanketed anything green. The heads looked cloaked in a lumpy white soot. Ruined.
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