A consideration of how the Covid-19 pandemic is requiring rapid change in social norms to protect vulnerable members of society, and how these norms are being reinforced. This article focuses on the realities now being faced by United States homeless populations.
The Courthouse
As the crowd of us left the courtroom, the fire alarm not shrill enough to shake up our slow file, I overheard the man in front of me comment: “The way things are going, this trial’s never going to end.” This wasn’t the only joking going on. As the case got started – it was October 16, the second day of the Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard trial – Judge Allison Burroughs reminded Harvard Dean of Admissions William R. Fitzsimmons that he would, in fact, still be under oath during the proceedings. It did not bode well when Judge Burroughs had to repeat the quip twice more for Fitzsimmons to understand.
Continue reading “Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard: The People, Concerned”
Thoughts on color, and memory; a poem of colorful impression; and pictures from summer’s Florida, riffing further on the color theme.
I have so many questions about how I will conduct myself in today’s United States. I have so many questions about how we converse to address hard hate. Ours is a country of multiplicity, and a country of unbridled spite. We march for personal freedoms, and we march for the Alt-Right. How can we cope with our divisions and our President’s revisions? Read on for thoughts on today’s US politics, and a photo gallery of a trip (at the end of the post) to NYC – a place I believe may hold some of the answers we seek.
It’s over a week now, and it’s a big job to get back into the swing of things in the Mother Land. While you were gallivanting abroad, details slipped from lack of refreshers: the Department of Motor Vehicles is a nightmare in some cities but not in others; there’s that tasty Tomato Bisque Soup© (questionably Organic) they sell at the Safeway; your grandma is still ornery, though she laughs more and she’s getting fat. There’s kale in supermarkets, you can buy three mansions and ten years of bunker food at Wegmans. You want to celebrate your first holiday, and cringe like you used to when you see people dressed in ugly American Flag-patterned ________________* for the 4th of July.
Continue reading “Coming Home (or, Back to Strange Lands and Good Ol’ Harley Farm)”
Sundry Travels 